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The Flag of Russia. 



LITTLE JOURNEYS 

TO 

RUSSIA 

AND 



AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



AUSTRIA-HUNGARY' 
By FELIX J. KOCH, A. B., A. G. S. 



Edited by 
MARIAN M. GEORGE 



CHICAGO 

A. FLANAGAN COMPANY 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two CoDies Received 
APR 2 '906 
r> Cooyrifirht Entry 

UAasZ, fQc(> 

CLASS Qj he No. 



Copyright, 1906 
By 
FLANAGAN COMPANY 



A Little Journey to 
Russia 



Russia is a country where the Ice King reigns 
half the year; where in winter the rivers freeze so deeply 
that railroads can be built on them and sledge roads 
are made the full length of their shining surface; where 
the lakes are ploughed by huge steamers which in- 
stead of cutting the waves bore their way through the 
ice; where sleighs fly over the slippery streets for so 
many months of the year that when summer really 
comes the horses seem unable to slacken their speed, 
but tear along the road at the same mad pace, dragging 
the carriages after them. 

The thermometer shows so many degrees of cold 
in this country that one's nose may become frosted 
before he knows it and have to be rubbed with snow 
to save it from freezing. The rich bundle up in furs 
until the city streets look like an animal exhibit, while 
the poor do not take off their clothing even at bed- 
time, but lie down to sleep, on top of their immense 
brick stoves, with their sheepskin coats still on. 

For about eight months every year the Russians 
shiver in the darkness, for the sun rises very late in 
the morning — long after we Americans have gone to 
school — and it sets in mid-afternoon. Then summer 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



comes with scorching heat, and the sun takes to shin- 
ing all day and nearly all night. Snow and ice quickly 
disappear. A wealth of brilliant-hued flowers gives 

color to parks 
and moors, and 
tourists arriving 
at this season 
find it hard to 
believe all the 
tales they have 
heard of Arctic 
cold in the 
czar's land. 

Of course we 
all know that 
the czar is the 
Emperor of Rus- 
sia. He rules 
over a giant 
countrv. It oc- 
cupies one-sixth 
of the land sur- 
face of the en- 
tire globe, and 
is second in size 
to the British Empire only. It is even more impos- 
ing than King Edward's realm, for the British Empire 
is composed of many lands scattered here and there 
and widely separated by oceans and continents. 

Russia sweeps straight across Northern Europe and 
Asia. It is continuous. Beginning in the west with 
Finland, it goes on with European Russia, Poland, 




NICHOLAS II., CZAR OF RUSSIA 




Scale of Statute Miles 

25 50 100 200 :S00 40 

Oopjrig'ht, 1904 , by Hanil, MuXaiiy & C o 



30" Longitude East 35"f rom Greenwich. 40 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 5 

the Caucasus, a great slice of central Asia, Siberia, 
and stops only at the Pacific coast. Its area is 8,644,- 
100 square miles. As an American traveler has said, 
"All the United States with Alaska would hardly 
make a patch for the healing of a rent on Russia's 
vast garment." And by the time you read this, the 
area may have increased several thousand square 
miles, for Russia adds new territory to her possessions 
with as much ease as she adds ships to her navy. 

Nicholas II., the czar, is the richest and most power- 
ful monarch of the world to-day, though only thirty- 
five years of age. He is what we call a despot — a 
sovereign whose will is law. He may deal with his 
subjects as he wishes; he rules absolutely over 113,- 
000,000 people ! And yet he is a very modest young 
man. Nicholas II. is the nephew of the gracious 
Queen Alexandra of England, and his sweet-faced 
wife was Queen Victoria's favorite granddaughter. 
This royal couple have four daughters and a son. 
They are taught English as well as Russian, and play 
with dolls and eat oatmeal for breakfast quite as 
naturally as though their papa were not a despot, the 
Emperor and Autocrat of all the Russias, Czar of 
Poland, and Grand-Prince of Finland. 

CHARACTER OF THE COUNTRY 

What shall we see in czarland? Not fine scenery 
certainly — just a vast flat farm, just plains and steppes, 
swamps and moors, desert wastes and bleak forests. 
There is little seaboard, and most of that little is on 
the ice-bound Arctic coast, or on the inland seas, the 
Black and the Caspian. The mountains are far away 



6 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



on the boundary line of European Russia. To those 
who have seen the Alps, or the Rockies, the Ural 
Mountains do not seem worth a visit, though they are 
rich in precious stones, in gold, silver, lead and iron. 
The Caucasus Moun- 
tains, between the 
Black and Caspian 
seas, are famed for 
their fine scenery, 
but they lie out of 
the track of our 
little journey. We 
shall be able to visit 
only a few places in 
European Russia. 

The czar has over 
a hundred different 
peoples and tribes 
in his empire. In 
order to be able to 
talk with them all 
in their native tongue 
he would have to 
learn about forty 
different languages 
and dialects. There 
are the Finns, the 

Poles, the Germans, the Jews, the Armenians, the 
Georgians, the Tartars, and all manner of strange 
Asiatic tribes. We shall not be able to visit all of 
these in their home- villages, but in our short journey 
we shall see the Russian people in every walk of life: 




♦'THE POLICE WATCH EVERY MAN, 
WOMAN AND CHILD" 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 7 

princes, pilgrims, Siberian exiles, soldiers, beggars, 
pedlers, tramps — and the police! 

We may not even travel in Russia without the per- 
mission of the police. We must have passports tell- 
ing who we are, whence we are come, where we are 
going, and much else about our private affairs. The 
police take charge of our passports during our stay in 
each place. We must have their permission to go 
even from one village to another. They are always 
at hand, in every corner of the empire, to demand 
one's passport and ask one questions. 

The police watch every man, woman, and child in 
Russia just as closely as they watch foreigners. They 
know the whereabouts of every one, down to the poor 
servant lass who goes on a short visit. They can tell 
what route she takes, the shops she enters, and with 
whom she talks. What the regular police do not 
know, the secret police find out. Nothing is easier 
in Russia than to be arrested "on suspicion" by the 
secret police and exiled to Siberia. If the suspected 
person is not a subject of the czar, he is escorted out 
of the country and forbidden to return. 

In Russia it is not safe to talk carelessly about the 
czar, his officials, the form of government, the Greek 
Church, or the police. For there is no telling to what 
the most innocent remark may lead. One may not 
even read such books and papers as he chooses. The 
Censor is a powerful official who decides what may 
or may not be printed and read in the empire, and a 
strict judge he is. A journey to Russia may prove 
exciting indeed. We mean to avoid suspicious con- 
duct, but if we should be arrested and thrown into a 



8 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

dungeon for a week or two, it would certainly be an 
experience worth describing in our letters home. 

With the feeling that we do not know what a day 
may bring forth, we plan our trip to this strange land. 
We shall visit, first, St. Petersburg, the capital of the 
empire, the story of whose building by Peter the Great 
reads like a tale of the days of giants. We must go 
to Moscow, once the only capital of Russia, and now 
the Holy City to all devout Russians. We shall make 
our way northward almost to reindeer land, to the 
Holy Isles in the White Sea, and steam down the 
Volga River to the southern limits of the empire. We 
must have a glimpse of Warsaw, the ancient capital 
of Poland, and cross the Gulf of Finland to the land 
of the Finns. And so let us be off! 

ST. PETERSBURG 

An ocean steamer carries us across the Baltic Sea 
and eastward through the Gulf of Finland. Kronstadt, 
a strong fortress on an island, here guards the entrance 
to the czar's country. While we are gazing from the 
steamer's deck upon the wharves, dockyards, and 
batteries of Kronstadt, some uniformed officials come 
on board. One of them prepares to examine our pass- 
ports. To our surprise, he signs ours without objection. 

Not all the passengers have such luck. One party 
of English people have to land at Kronstadt and wait, 
under the care of the police, until their passports are 
made right. Nobody knows what is wrong with the 
papers — nobody but the official, who looks as impor- 
tant as though the czar's life were intrusted to his 
sole care. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



9 



And now our 
boat steams up 
the broad River 
Neva toward the 
city of Peter the 
Great, the cap- 
ital of the Rus- 
sian Empire. 
The Neva flows 
from Lake La- 
doga, the largest 
lake in Europe, 
into the Gulf of 
Finland. On 
the banks of 
the stream and 
on the numerous 
islands formed 
by the different 
river mouths, 
stands St. Petersburg. We see its cluster of roofs, 
domes, spires, and pinnacles ahead of us. One immense 
golden dome shines like a ball of fire. That is the 
dome of St. Isaac's Cathedral. And there, rising 
against the sky, is a high, glittering spire as fine as a 
needle to our sight — the spire of the fortress church 
beneath which lie buried Peter the Great and all the 
czars since his time. 

More bearded officials in uniform meet us as we land 
at the city docks. Here is the customhouse, where 
we pay the examiner a silver ruble (worth about fifty- 
eight cents), to keep him from turning the contents 




RUSSIAN CAB DRIVER 



10 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

of our trunks upside down. And here are the droshky 
or cab drivers disputing with one another for the 
privilege of taking us to a hotel. 

The Neva, glistening, and broad as a lake, its water 
of the clearest blue, is covered with sea-going craft, 
pleasure boats, river barges, and fishing smacks. The 
river banks are faced with massive red granite quays; 
buildings of solid masonry overlook the water. Islands 
far out in the river are covered with buildings. 

People all about us are speaking in the strange Rus- 
sian tongue. More than half the men seem to be in 
uniform. Their badges often show a silver double- 
headed eagle. This double-headed eagle is a symbol 
of the united Eastern and Western empires. 

Racing through the broad, broad streets in a drosh- 
ky, we get a general idea of St. Petersburg. It is 
just a fine modern city with wide streets, huge palaces, 
excellent shops, some green squares, parks, and pleasure 
grounds, a monument here and there, and a busy 
populace. It might be a German city, or a French 
one, or even an American one, except for the appear- 
ance of the people. 

We see a priest of the Greek Church. He has long 
hair and flowing robes, and even wears a beard. He 
looks like no priest we have ever seen before. And 
there go some peasants in red cotton blouses, queer 
caps, and baggy trousers tucked inside huge boots. 
A Russian peasant is called a mujik. Now we pass 
a street shrine where a Russian peasant woman in 
short skirts and richly embroidered apron is kneeling 
before the picture of a saint. Now we see a church 
with a cluster of big domes painted blue and dotted 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 11 

with gold stars. Another church has green domes. 
Many of the houses are covered with stucco and painted 
terra cotta, pale pink, or yellow. The roofs are of 
sheet iron colored red or green. 

Our droshky is a humble little vehicle, very uncom- 
fortable, in which there is barely room for two passen- 
gers. It is drawn by a single horse wearing so little 
harness that we wonder what holds him to the carriage. 
Over his head is a high arched yoke gaily painted. 
The droshky driver sits on a high seat in front. He 
is a great big fellow, with a baggy coat belted in at 
the waist, high boots, and a cloth cap which he lifts 
politely in answering our questions. He speaks broken 
English, learned during a year's stay in the United 
States. 

Many of this driver's friends have emigrated to 
America, he says. While his old mother lives he must 
stay in Russia. But when she is gone, back he will 
go to the land where passports and secret police, and 
censors, and low wages cease from troubling an honest 
workman. 

Our cabman drives furiously, making us rejoice that 
the droshky is swung close to the ground so that an 
upset would not injure us greatly. Though the sturdy 
little horse goes at a frightful pace, he never runs into 
anything, being easily controlled. Cab-drivers here 
are arrested if they injure a pedestrian. A droshky 
driver is called an isvoshchik, which word serves as a 
sample of the Russian language. 

Our hotel looks like any large modern hotel, but it 
proves to be second-rate, as are the hotels of all Russian 
cities. The rooms are untidy, the servants lazy and 



12 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

talkative, and there are fleas in the carpets, and else- 
where. But the beds are clean, so we unpack our 
baggage, hang up our United States flag and our pic- 
ture of the President, and order tea served in our 
room. Each floor of the hotel has its own servants 
and a little kitchen, from which one may quickly 
obtain a " short order" meal of tea, toast, eggs, and 
other simply prepared dishes. 

The waitress brings us a Russian tea urn, called a 
samovar. This is a tall copper urn with a cylinder 
in the center where charcoal burns. This keeps the 
water in the urn at boiling heat, so that tea may be 
freshly made for each cup. The samovar belongs 
particularly to Russia, which is a nation of tea-drink- 
ers. The Russians import vast quantities of tea from 
China, some of it of very fine quality. While here, 
we shall drink our tea in Russian style, from a glass, 
with a slice of lemon in it, no milk, and the lump of 
sugar held in our fingers, to be sucked between sips. 

At seven o'clock in the evening we have a Russian 
dinner; and if the hotels are second-rate in other re- 
spects, they are " tip-top" when it comes to meals. 
Russians are hearty eaters. The meal begins with an 
"appetizer." On the sideboard are numerous dishes, 
containing cheese, dried fruits, pickles, potted fish, 
smoked sturgeon, smoked ham, pickled herring, chicken 
and game; and there, too, are wines, and wonderful 
Russian brews, spicy and delicious. 

The appetizer seems to us a full meal in itself, and 
after it come soups, fish pie, roasts, vegetables, pud- 
dings and confectionery, with glass after glass of scald- 
ing hot tea. « 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



13 



We are delighted with the cakes, pastry, and sweets. 
Russians have famous appetites for such goodies. 
Nowhere else in Europe do pastry-cooks and candy- 
makers receive wages so high as those paid them in 
St. Petersburg, Moscow, Odessa, and other Russian 
cities. Some one has said that a Russian may be 
without towels and soap, combs and brushes, brooms 
and matches, but nowhere is he far from a candy shop. 

We taste none of the peculiar Russian dishes of which 
we have heard, leaving them till chance takes us to a 
restaurant later on. We give our waiter some kopecks 
(copper coins worth 
one hundredth part 
of a silver ruble), 
and, summoning a 
droshkv, start for an 
after-dinner drive 
through the beauti- 
ful summer gardens 
on the islands of the 
Neva. 

These islands are 
connected by numer- 
ous fine bridges, and 
are occupied by 
public buildings, the 
summer villas of the 
nobles, pleasure gar- 
dens, driveways, 
open-air theaters, 
and pavilions where 
bands play. On the 




A PIE SELLER 



14 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

island of Vassili Ostroff are the customhouse, the 
Academy of Sciences, the Academy of Fine Arts, the 
barracks, the buildings of the mining corps, the Ex- 
change, and other stately structures. 

We go to Strelka Point and have a splendid view 
of this mighty city. We look out toward the Gulf of 
Finland and still may see the sunset glow across its 
waters. One could see the summer sun all night 
long from the top of a high building. We drive 
from island to island, often in a fairyland of lights, 
fountains, flower gardens, pavilions, terraces, swaying 
vines and shadowy trees. Boats with festoons of 
electric lights ply the river in every direction. Music 
sounds from cafe and garden. 

It is a fascinating place, and the very next morning 
we return to the summer gardens and loiter about 
amid the trees, looking at the flowers, fountains, and 
statuary. 

We see a monument to Kriloff, the Russian writer 
of fables, who was the special delight of Russian 
children. They still like to read his queer stories 
about horses, cows, sheep, donkeys, foxes, wolves, hens, 
and other fur and feather folk. Kriloff died at St. 
Petersburg in 1844. Around the pedestal of his monu- 
ment figures of his animal friends are carved in relief. 
Kriloff himself is represented in his dressing-gown, 
seated in his arm chair, apparently gazing down upon 
this procession of animals. 

Looking upon the Neva, its banks and islands, we 
see how low is the site of the city. It was built on 
marshes and -has several times been flooded by the 
waters of the Gulf of Finland, which, driven by terrible 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



15 



winds, backed up into the river, causing an overflow. 
St. Petersburg is an unhealthful place. Fevers rage 
among the poor, who live in crowded underground 
rooms along the river banks. When the Neva rises 
high these wretched cellar homes are flooded, and the 
tenants are driven out upon the street. Then as soon 




ALEXANDER COLUMN AND THE GENERALTY 



as the waters subside, the poor return to their un- 
wholesome homes, where disease sweeps them off by 
hundreds. 

How did the Russian capital happen to be built in 
such a spot? Let us visit the tomb of its founder, 
Peter the Great — the truly greatest czar in Russian 
history, and one of the most remarkable men in all 



16 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

history — and there speak of the founding of this city. 
East of the island of Vassili Ostroff is the fortress 
island with its Cathedral of St. Peter and St. Paul. 
This cathedral is the burial place of Peter the Great 
and of all the czars but one since his time. We pass 
within the dark fortress walls (for the cathedral is 
inside the fortress) and before entering the church 
pause to look up at its beautiful spire, which we saw 
on approaching the city. Richly gilded, the spire 
rises over three hundred feet above the ground. On 
its peak stands the figure of an angel bearing aloft a 
cross. 

In the gloomy interior of the church are the marble 
tombs of Russian royalty whose bodies lie beneath 
the floor. Here rests Czar Peter; and but a few steps 
from this church is the little hut where he lived while 
superintending the building of his capital city. He 
laid the foundations of this fortress in 1703, as the 
very beginning of St. Petersburg. 

Although Russia is over a thousand years old, she 
is still called a young nation. This is because for 
many centuries she was not half civilized, was even a 
barbarous nation, and so was of small importance 
among the civilized peoples of Europe. For over two 
centuries (from 1237 to 1481) Russia was overrun by 
the Tartars, an Asiatic horde, cruel and barbarous, 
and was subject to them. 

When New York city had been settled nearly a 
hundred years, and Boston over seventy, the place 
where St. Petersburg now stands was a desolate swamp 
half under water, surrounded by forests, its wastes 
visited by only a few poor fishermen. Russia was 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 17 

still a country of which the rest of Europe knew little 
and for which it cared less. 

Russians then lived as do the half-civilized peoples 
of the Far East to-day. The men wore robes and 
flowing beards, and kept their wives and daughters 
hidden in a kind of harem. When the women appeared 
in the streets they were veiled, or rode in carriages 
with curtains drawn. Wife-beating was a common 
custom; only priests advised the husbands not to use 
too thick a club. 

When the czar's subjects appeared before their ruler 
they prostrated themselves to the ground, with heads 
bent in the dust. Schools, libraries, museums, hos- 
pitals were wholly lacking. There was no navy; no 
disciplined Russian army. In remoter parts of the 
land bands of armed men pillaged and plundered as 
they chose. The czar murdered his subjects, and the 
people now and then murdered a czar. Moscow was 
the capital. 

Peter the Great began to reign when he was seven- 
teen years old. His elder sister Sophia had tried to 
keep the government in her own hands and to make 
him unfit to rule by purposely giving him no education 
and placing every evil temptation in his way. He 
had a hot temper, was coarse in manner and ignorant 
of books. But he had "a keen thirst for knowledge, 
high ambitions for his empire, and a will of iron. 

His empire was then inland, except on the northern 
boundary, where the Polar sea broke on icebergs. 
Archangel, his only seaport, was ice-bound almost 
the year around. The Swedes were between Peter's 
land and the Baltic; the Turks kept him from the 



18 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



Black Sea; and the Persians were in possession of 
the region along the Caspian. Peter knew that no 
country could prosper without communication by 
sea with other lands. He wanted a seaport, " a window 
toward Europe." 

"It is not land I need, but water!" he cried. So 
he fought the Swedes until he wrested from them 
the Baltic provinces. This gave him a seaboard. 

The only place for his sea- 
port was thus the low land 
where the River Neva flows 
into the Gulf of Finland. 
It was a most unpromising 
site for a city. The sea 
often flooded these swamps. 
It was so far north that the 
harbor would be ice-bound 
six months in the year, 
while for two months every 
year there is no night at 
all, dawn beginning where 
twilight ends; and for two winter months the 
daylight lasts less than five hours in every twenty- 
four. 

There was not only no dry land upon which to build 
a city, but also no material with which to construct 
it — no stones, clay, or wood. To cap all these diffi- 
culties, there were no workmen, and no tools; and 
lying in wait for Peter, just across the Baltic Sea, 
was his chief enemy, King Charles XII. of Sweden. 
Peter cared nothing for difficulties. He enjoyed 
hard tasks. When he decided to do a thing, he did 




ssSsSrN!* ™ 



PETER THE GREAT 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 19 

it. He built his log hut here on this island of the 
Neva, and with his own hands laid the first stones 
of the fortress. 

Thousands of laborers were brought to the task 
from all parts of his empire : Finns, Russians, Tartars, 
Cossacks, even criminals from Siberia. They had 
no tools; so Peter ordered them to dig with their 
hands and carry earth in their caps or in bags made 
of their clothing. Stone was needed; so Peter pro- 
hibited the use of stone in any other city of his em- 
pire and had every boat in Russia bringing stone 
to his new capital. 

Cold, hunger, and fevers killed his workmen. More 
were brought to take their places. Over a hundred 
thousand men perished during the first year of building 
St. Petersburg. Meantime Charles XII. of Sweden 
sent word that when he had time he would come 
and burn down Peter's wooden town. 

In less than nine years the new capital was ready 
for inhabitants. It was protected by the fortress 
on this island, and had a harbor. Peter now ordered 
people to come and live in his city. Three hundred 
and fifty noble families were moved from Moscow 
to St. Petersburg, where they were forced to build 
palaces for themselves in the places pointed out 
to them by Peter. He commanded merchants, arti- 
sans, and mechanics to move hither from every part 
of his empire. He brought artists and engineers 
from all over Europe to his city, selecting the inhabi- 
tants for his new capital just as a housekeeper would 
choose furniture for her house. 

Splendid buildings rose in St. Petersburg on all 



20 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

sides. Much care had to be taken in laying all foun- 
dations, because the soil was wet and yielding. It 
is said that the foundations of St. Petersburg have 
cost almost as mu'ch as the city. Piles must be 
driven into the marshy land, one upon another, 
extending downward row on row until a building 
reaches as far into the earth as it does into the air. 

Thus six hundred acres have been reclaimed from 
waste land and made into the city of Peter the Great. 
Charles XII. did not burn down Peter's wooden town. 
He was defeated by Peter once and for all at Poltava. 

Peter's little hut on the fortress island has been 
carefully preserved by enclosing it within an outer 
shell. One little room has been fitted up as a chapel, 
to which many devout Russians come often for prayer. 

Leaving the fortress of St. Peter and St. Paul, 
we cross the Neva to the main part of the city. Let 
us drive down the chief boulevard, called the Nevski 
Prospect. It runs parallel with the Neva, giving 
a view of the river, as its name indicates. At one 
end of this fine boulevard is the building of the Ad- 
miralty, with a tall gilt spire bearing on its peak a 
golden ship for a weathervane. 

From the Admiralty square, the Nevski Prospect 
extends three miles in a straight, level course. It 
is as broad as a Paris boulevard and is bordered 
by handsome buildings, churches, shops, the Winter 
Palace, St. Isaac's Cathedral, the Imperial Library, 
the home of Nicholas II. and his family, and other 
places of interest. 

Pedestrians and vehicles throng the Nevski at all 
hours, yet so broad are these St. Petersburg streets 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



21 



and so vast the squares, that one almost feels lonely. 
The crowds of people do not seem like crowds. How- 
ever, St. Petersburg has a population of 1,003,315. 
It is the fourth city in size in Europe. 

Among the handsome coaches and smart traps 
on the Nevski, we 
see many troikas. A 
troika is a vehicle 
drawn by three 
horses abreast, only 
the middle horse be- 
ing harnessed in the 
shafts, with the 
high arched yoke 
over his neck. The 
two outer horses, 
harnessed by a rein, 
have their heads 
bent outward. They 
must be kept at a 
gallop, the middle 
horse at a desperate 
trot. At its best, 
the troika is a very 
dashing turnout, 
peculiarly Russian. 

In winter the 
sleighs, drawn by three horses thus harnessed, must 
be a gallant sight. On country roads bells jingle on 
the high yokes of the horses, but in the cities no bells 
are permitted. Instead the drivers shout a warning 
to one another as they meet. Add to this the snap- 




A HOUSE PORTER CARRYING WATER 



22 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

ping of whips, the clucking noise that the drivers 
make as they urge forward their swift horses, and 
the cries of " Faster! faster!" from gay merrymakers 
in the sleighs, and the scene must be exciting. 

Almost as swiftly as a sleigh our carriage flies up 
and down the Nevski, finally leaving us at Admiralty 
Place, the square where are situated the chief public 
buildings. Here we see the splendid equestrian statue 
of Peter the Great. It is of bronze, mounted upon a 
block of Finland granite which weighs fifteen hundred 
tons — said to be the very stone on which Peter stood 
watching while his navy gained a victory over the 
Swedes. 

The monument represents Peter astride his steed, 
which he is reining in at full gallop on the brink of 
a precipice. His face is turned toward the Neva, 
while his right hand points to the city which he caused 
to rise from the frozen swamps. Under the horse's 
feet is a serpent, the symbol of those obstacles which 
Peter overcame in building his capital. Falconet, 
a French sculptor, designed this monument for the 
Empress Catherine II. The inscription upon it reads. 

TO PETER I. 

FROM CATHERINE II. 

1782 

Peter's monument peers out through the trees 
of a little park, upon the great church opposite it. 

RUSSIAN CHURCHES 

St. Isaac's Cathedral is one of the grandest modern 
churches of Europe. Its golden dome rising brightly 
above the city roofs is always the first object to catch 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



23 



the eyes of the traveler approaching St. Petersburg. 
This mighty central dome is surrounded by a cluster 
of smaller ones, each surmounted by a gilded cross. 
Mounting to the central dome, we have a broad 
view of the city, which, as some one has said, looks 
from here like a barge so overladen, in the midst of 




ST. ISAAC'S CATHEDRAL 



the waters, that if one put a few more tons upon it 
it would sink. Some people even prophesy that 
St. Petersburg will be destroyed by flood one of these 
days. 

From this dome we look directly down upon St. 
Isaac's roof. The church is of marble and Finland 
granite, built in the form of a Greek cross. All the 
treasures of Russian quarries and Russian mines 



24 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



have been brought together in adorning it. Descending 
to the street, we enter the church by one of the four 
magnificent entrances. Each is approached by three 
flights of stone steps, and each flight is cut from a 
single block of rose granite. 

We pass through a portico supported by granite 
pillars polished like 
mirrors. Each pillar 
is a monolith (a col- 
umn cut from a sin- 
gle block of stone) 60 
feet high and 7 feet 
in diameter, with a 
weight of 128 tons. 
These monoliths are 
the largest ever quar- 
ried. No wonder it 
took twenty-five years 
merely to lay the 
foundations of this 
massive building. 
Forty years were con- 
sumed in building the 
cathedral, and $14,- 
000,000. In all $65,- 
000,000 has been ex- 
pended upon it since 
it was begun. 

In this great church a priest is conducting service. 
A burst of glorious music greets us as we enter. The 
congregation is standing. Many persons hold tapers 
in their hands. Lights blaze here and there before 




A BISHOP OF THE GREEK CHURCH 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 25 

holy pictures adorned with countless jewels. The 
priest is in the richest robes and chants his part of 
the service with a splendid bass voice. All about 
we look upon gems, carvings, and jewel-decked paint- 
ings. The pavement is of variegated marble; the 
altars blaze with precious stones; the walls are inlaid 
with verd-antique. 

There is no organ. The Russian Church has no 
music but that of male voices; but the services are 
almost all music, and the voices are such as we may 
hear nowhere else in the world. Nowhere outside 
of Russia are there such basses, while the soprano 
sung by boys is wonderfully sweet and clear. The 
choir is concealed from view behind a screen. 

There are no pews. The congregation stands or 
kneels. Even the czar must stand. As the service 
often lasts two hours, this is a test of one's piety 
and strength. But the Russian churches are crowded 
always. There never was a more religious people 
than the Russians. Besides, they must obey their 
priests. Usually there are even more men at church 
than women. Women are never allowed to sing 
in a Russian church; nor may they enter the holy 
place, a sacred room behind the altar. 

We see no images in this cathedral such as are 
everywhere in a Roman Catholic Church. The Greek 
Church (or Russian, as we have been calling it) does 
not permit the use of images. Instead there are 
sacred pictures of the Saviour, the Virgin and the 
saints, called icons. Every icon in the church is 
framed with rich jewels, the gift of worshipers whose 
prayers to the saint have been answered. 



26 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

On entering a church the pious Russian buys a 
candle to place before the icon of his guardian angel. 
Kneeling before the picture, he kisses it, and bows 
his forehead to the pavement in prayer. Often during 
the service the members of the congregation fall 
upon their knees, bowing their foreheads to the floor. 

Prayer is to the Russians an hourly exercise. They 
are forever prostrating themselves in prayer, mak- 
ing the sign of the cross, and burning candles 
before icons. Saints' days are constantly being cele- 
brated. Feasts and fasts occupy so many days that 
a devout Russian has left but one hundred and thirty 
working days in a year. The Greek Church has 
endless rites and ceremonies. Baptisms, marriages, 
deaths, harvests — all are honored by the Church with 
long religious ceremonies. All new buildings must 
be blessed by the priest before they are used, even 
hotels, railway stations, jails, and factories. 

After the people have left St. Isaac's Cathedral, 
we spend an hour or more examining the ornaments 
and treasures of this vast church. The columns of 
malachite are the largest columns of this costly mineral 
found anywhere in the world. There are beautiful 
pillars of lapis-lazuli, and exquisite mosaics. 

The chief wealth of treasure consists in the jeweled 
icons. An icon is like no other painting, for only 
the face and hands of the figure are painted, the 
rest of the picture is raised work in silver or gold. 
The frames of many are closely set with rubies, dia- 
monds, amethysts, sapphires, and pearls. Stored 
away in caskets are the richest of priestly vest- 
ments and other relics. The Greek Church is not 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 27 

only the most ancient Christian church, but also the 
richest by far. 

We pass a street shrine, one of many hundred in 
St. Petersburg. These shrines are tiny chapels which 
in appearance have been likened to toll-houses. Each 
has on its walls the picture of the saint to which it is 
dedicated. Every passer-by crosses himself, doffs 
his cap, or kneels in prayer at the shrine. 

This shrine near the St. Nicholas Bridge is dedicated 
to Saint Nicholas. A mujik is kneeling, with his 
forehead upon the ground, before the sacred picture 
of Saint Nicholas; he even kisses the pavement. 
Nicholas is a popular saint, being the patron of children, 
sailors, pilgrims, nobles, and adventurers. The Book 
of Saints declares him the most powerful saint in 
heaven, though he was once just a poor Russian 
priest. 

All along the splendid Nevski Prospect are churches. 
Indeed, this boulevard has been called " Toleration 
Avenue' ' because it is bordered by churches of so 
many different faiths: Greek, Roman Catholic, Dutch, 
Lutheran, and Armenian. The Cathedral of our Lady 
of Kazan is dedicated to the Virgin, and has a 
wealth of precious stones and jewels lavished upon it. 

Kazan, in eastern Russia, was once a Tartar capital, 
strongly fortified and defended, and a source of 
much trouble to the Russians. Under Ivan the 
Terrible, a fierce, warlike czar, the Russian soldiers 
took Kazan, carrying at the head of their columns 
a precious picture of the Virgin. They believed that 
the Virgin gave them the victory over their Tartar 
enemies, and they built this cathedral in memory of 



28 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

the event. The picture, richly covered with jewels 
and pearls, is worshiped here. 

We see here on the walls all manner of war trophies, 
flags taken in battle and keys of captured cities; 
and here are even tombs of generals killed in the 
war with France. It seems strange to attend service 
in this vast church, where the chorus of men's voices 
rises to the roof in solemn chants; where prayers, 
and incense, and kneeling figures all speak of peace in 
the midst of memories of wars on wars. 

We see a church of white marble, the Smolni Cathe- 
dral; and the splendid Memorial Church, built on the 
spot where Alexander II. was assassinated by dynamite 
bombs thrown by Nihilists. 

Around the belfries of all the churches fly flocks 
of pigeons. Such a fluttering of wings as there always 
is about the spires and domes! We see many crows 
and magpies, too, but the pigeon, or dove, is sacred 
in Russia. The people say that the Holy Spirit 
descended upon Christ in the form of a dove, and so 
the dove must be protected and cared for. 

SIGHTS OF THE CITY 

Not far from St. Isaac's Cathedral we see the famous 
Alexander column. It stands before a crescent-shaped 
line of buildings called the staff headquarters and 
rises to a total height of 154 feet. St. Petersburg 
is proud of this column because the shaft, 84 feet high 
and 14 feet in diameter, is the largest monolith of 
modern times. It is of red Finland granite and rises 
from a pedestal of bronze, being surmounted by a 
bronze capital. On the capital stands the figure of 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



29 




WINTER PALACE AND ALEXANDER COLUMN 



an angel bearing aloft a cross. The angel is 14 feet 
high — over twice the height of a tall man. The bronze 
used for pedestal and capital was melted down from 
Turkish cannon captured in battle. On the pedestal 
is a simple inscription: 

GRATEFUL RUSSIA TO ALEXANDER I. 

Alexander I. was czar when Napoleon Bonaparte 
marched into Russia with a vast army to conquer 
the empire; but the Russians set fire to Moscow, 
compelled the French to retreat in winter when snow 
and sto'rm killed many, and delivered not only 
Russia but all Europe from the French conqueror. 
Alexander I. was hailed as the Deliverer. 



30 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

Because of its great weight the column was given a 
foundation about 150 feet deep. Yet it is said to be 
settling slowly downward and thus may be destroyed 
in time. The climate is so severe in winter that all 
the monuments and public buildings are suffering. 
Every June, in St. Petersburg, an army of painters 
and decorators is set at work recoloring the stucco 
houses and repairing the chipped and cracked orna- 
ments on the buildings. So summer shows the cap- 
ital beautified anew. 

On the Neva bank facing the square of the Admiralty 
stands the Winter Palace. It is one of the largest and 
finest royal palaces in Europe, but is now used only for 
court receptions, balls, and state ceremonies. The czar 
Nicholas II. and his family, when in St. Petersburg, 
live in the Anitchkoff Palace on the Nevski Prospect. 
Near the Winter Palace we pass a small guard-house, 
before which stands a palace guard as immovable as 
a statue. He wears an enormous top-lofty fur cap, 
his uniform is decorated with straps and medals, 
and the rifle by his side is highly polished. 

The Winter Palace has always been well guarded, 
but in spite of care the Nihilists, a party of desperate 
people who wished to overthrow the Government, 
gained entrance there about twenty years ago and 
blew up with dynamite a portion of several rooms. 
Alexander II. was czar at that time. He was grand- 
father of the present czar and is called the Emancipa- 
tor, because in 1861 he freed the serfs of his empire. 

After two hundred and sixty years of serfdom, 
fifty million Russian peasants became free men at 
the command of Alexander II. As serfs they were 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 31 

fixed to the soil which they tilled. When an estate 
was sold the serfs went with it as a part of the fixtures, 
like the cattle and farm implements. Their condition 
was one of utter misery. Several czars had deter- 
mined to abolish serfdom, but until Alexander II. 
came to the throne no one ever really undertook the 
task. The peasants greatly loved him; so did all 
good people in his empire. But the Nihilists hated 
czars and determined to kill him. Five times they 
attempted it and twice nearly succeeded. 

After being conducted through one imposing apart- 
ment after another in the Winter Palace, where 
polished marble, frescos, paintings, gems, statuary, 
and costly curios glitter everywhere, we come to a 
simple little room sacred to the memory of Alexander 
II. On Sunday morning, March 13, 1881, he left 
this little room, and went out to inspect a regiment 
of marines. An hour later he was carried back, fast 
bleeding to death, one leg shattered to the thigh, 
the other to the knee, and placed upon the narrow 
iron bed in the recess, and there he breathed his last. 

As he was driving homeward to the palace a bomb 
had been thrown beneath his carriage. Stepping 
unhurt from the carriage to approach the assassin, 
whom the police had seized, he was struck down by 
another bomb. Then he was carried home to the 
little room. 

Thus the Russian czar who freed fifty million slaves 
suffered death by assassination just as did our own 
Emancipator, Abraham Lincoln. The- negro slaves 
were freed in 1863, but two years after Russian serf - 
dom was abolished. Russia fought no war of libera- 



32 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



tion; the serfs were bought from their owners by the 
Government, set free, and given enough land to 
make a home for each family. 

We turn away, to wander through the Throne Room 
of Peter the Great, and through the vast Hall of St. 
George, which has been the scene of many grand balls 
and court receptions. This hall is 140 feet long and 
60 feet wide; for court festivities it is transformed into 
a wonderful summer garden with tropical plants, 
flowers, foliage, music, and fountains, amid which the 
brilliant uniforms of the nobles and the satins and 
jewels of the ladies make a beautiful picture. 

We see the crown jewels of Russia in a room guarded 
day and night. The czar's crown is heavy with dia- 
monds, being in the form of a dome upon the top of 




THE HERMITAGE 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 33 

which is an immense ruby, bearing a cross of almost 
priceless diamonds. The czarina's crown is a mass of 
precious gems. 

Adorning the czar's scepter is the famous Orloff 
diamond, said to be the most magnificent jewel in the 
world. Once this diamond formed the eye of an idol 
in a temple in India. A French soldier stole it and 
sold it for two thousand guineas. Finally it was 
bought by Prince Orloff, who paid over half a million 
dollars for it and presented it to Empress Catherine II. 

We could spend days of sightseeing in the Winter 
Palace, it is so large. Several thousand people at 
a time have dwelt beneath its roof. Merely the 
brooms with which to sweep it cost a small fortune 
each year. The exterior is not really fine, though the 
size makes it imposing ; the outer walls are of stucco, 
painted yellow and brown. 

THE HERMITAGE 

We cross a bridge from the Winter Palace to the 
Hermitage, now an art museum, but formerly a little 
palace built for Catherine II. as a refuge from the 
cares of her empire. Here she gathered about her 
a group of celebrated artists, musicians, men of letters 
and philosophers — just as Frederick the Great of 
Prussia had his group of illustrious men about him at 
Sans Souci Palace near Berlin. 

The present Hermitage has been rebuilt since Cath- 
erine's time. It is rich in art treasures: pictures by 
Dutch, Flemish, German, and Spanish Old Masters; 
and collections of antique sculptures — especially speci- 
mens of Greek vases, urns, and the like, excavated 



34 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

from ruins on the north coast. of the Black Sea and 
supposed to have been wrought by Greek colonists 
six hundred years before the time of Christ. This is 
one of the most valuable collections. 

There are in every nook of the Hermitage coins, 
gems, frescos, silken tapestries, porphyry vases, mala- 
chite tables, candelabra of violet jasper, ivory carvings, 
and rare books. We walk through long galleries full 
of books. It seems a pity that so much wealth should 
be shut up in palace libraries when forty-nine fiftieths 
of the Russian people receive no education in schools! 

One gallery opening from the Hermitage contains 
relics of Peter the Great. In the center of the rcom 
is a life-size wax effigy of Peter, seated in his own chair. 
In his hand is a sword given him by a deposed ruler of 
Poland. Here is the chariot in which Peter often 
drove; and here the horse which he rode at the battle 
of Pultava, when he defeated Charles XII. of Sweden. 
The charger is stuffed and is kept in a glass case. 
His favorite dogs also are preserved here; and we are 
shown casts of Peter's head taken after his death. On 
the walls are several portraits of him, one done in 
mosaic. 

Peter was a man of giant height. We see the wooden 
rod with which he was measured. It is notched a 
foot above a tall man's head. His walking stick is 
a heavy iron staff. We are shown his books, his tools 
(turning lathes, knives and chisels), specimens of his 
wood-carving, his telescopes, his drawing and surgical 
implements. 

Peter early determined to civilize his subjects and 
make Russia a great power among European nations. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 35 

But first he must educate himself. So he studied 
foreign languages, science, art, ship-building and 
military tactics. Every art and handicraft which 
could help him in his purpose he mastered, working 
night and day. Besides, he sent fifty young nobles 
to European courts to study, and in time followed 
them, going to the Netherlands first, to learn ship- 
building and seamanship. 

Dressing himself in disguise and calling himself 
Peter Mikhailof, a Dutch skipper, Peter worked at 
ship-building in the village of Zaandam, Holland. Then 
he studied in Amsterdam, learning anatomy, geography, 
astronomy; nothing escaped him. He learned about 
everything he saw; rope-making, cutlery, the whaling 
industry, paper manufacture, how to pull teeth, and 
how to use a miscroscope. He was entertained at 
stately receptions at The Hague, where the Dutch 
nobility thought the Czar of Russia the strangest 
man ever born. His immense size and rude manners 
and his eagerness to learn amazed them. 

Peter decided that Russia must have a navy. So 
he returned home accompanied by a ship-load of 
naval officers, shipwrights, riggers and sail-makers, 
to teach his people seamanship. He was accompanied, 
too, by engineers, artists, surgeons and others dis- 
tinguished in every art and profession. 

With the aid of these he began to civilize his empire 
wholesale. He ordered all Russian men to shave 
their beards and dress in modern garments. At every 
city gate were stationed barbers and tailors, guarded 
by soldiers, whose duty it was to shave the long- 
bearded men and cut off their long coats. Of course 



36 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

the Russians were bitterly opposed to all this, but 
Peter had his way. He decreed that the women should 
put aside veils, cease to live in harems, wear European 
clothing, and even attend balls and other social 
gatherings. 

The nobles had always presented themselves pros- 
trate before him, their faces laid in the dust. Peter 
ordered them up, even using a stick on them if they 
forgot their new manners. Strange as his method seems, 
it was largely successful. Russia quickly took on 
the outward appearance of modern civilization, where 
other barbaric nations have found it a slow growth. 
Peter established schools, hospitals, museums, a botan- 
ical garden, printing-houses, a medical college, and 
libraries. He gave Russia a navy, a disciplined army, 
and a brand-new seaport and capital city. 

THE IMPERIAL LIBRARY 

Loitering down the Nevski Prospect, we enter the 
Imperial Public Library. The catalogue tells us of 
the riches of this library. There are here over a million 
volumes and thousands of valuable manuscripts and 
engravings. Catherine II., the most famous empress 
of Russia, established this library; and her statue 
stands in front of the building. We are shown here 
the most valuable book in the world, a manuscript 
copy of the Old and New Testaments in Greek, written 
but three hundred and thirt}^ years after the birth of 
Christ. 

During the persecutions of the Christians by the 
Roman emperors, in the first centuries after Christ, one 
wicked emperor undertook to search out all the copies 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 37 

of the sacred books and burn them. It looked as 
though the Bible would be destroyed, and the world 
would lose it. But the Christians hid their copies of 
it — there were but a few copies — guarding the sacred 
book at the risk of being tortured to death. 

When Constantine, the first Christian emperor, 
began to reign, the best copies of the Bible were sought 
out, carefully compared, and revised. Then Constan- 
tine ordered fifty copies of this revised version to be 
made on the finest skins, by the best scribes. From 
these fifty copies all other editions were taken, but 
at length the fifty were no longer used and gradually 
disappeared. 

In 1859 a learned gentleman, Tischendorf, dis- 
covered an ancient manuscript in the convent of St. 
Catherine on Mount Sinai. It was in excellent condi- 
tion, not a single leaf had been lost or mutilated, and 
it proved to be one of those fifty copies made by order 
of Constantine ! The story of its discovery by Tischen- 
dorf reads like a romance. The copy was brought 
to St. Petersburg and placed in the Imperial Library 
early in the nineteenth century. 

There are over fifteen hundred manuscripts of the 
Bible in existence at present, but this one is the most 
valued of three very precious ones. The Alexandrine 
manuscript in the British Museum, London, and the 
Vatican manuscript in the Vatican at Rome are the 
other two. 

THE MARKET 

We spend much time among the shops of the Gos- 
tinnoi Dvor, the great marketplace on the Nevski 



38 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

Prospect. It is like the bazaars of the Far East, with 
rows of small shops under one vast arcade. The 
articles for sale cover every need of man, it seems: 
furs, food, household goods, from the largest article 
to the least, clothing, carriages, pictures, horses, 
libraries, uniforms, flowers, tapestry, and curios from 
every land. We buy a brass samovar, and jewelry 
of malachite and lapis-lazuli from Siberian mines, and 
embroidered slippers and sashes from the Tartar 
provinces of eastern Russia, and a number of articles 
made in St. Petersburg factories. 

Petersburg, as the Russians call their capital, is a 
commercial center for the whole empire. Goods 
come from far inland points to St. Petersburg by way 
of the canals which connect the different river systems 
with this harbor. Thousands of people are employed 
in the St. Petersburg factories. There are glass-works, 
tanneries, sugar-refineries, cotton-mills, breweries, to- 
bacco-works, a porcelain manufactory, and a carpet 
manufactory modeled after that of the Gobelins at 
Paris. 

As we loiter among the shops we see people from 
every province of the czar's empire. Here are beauti- 
ful women from Georgia, south of the Caucasus. 
Georgia is famous for its beautiful women. And here 
are Finns — short, sturdy, and always neat, though 
they are seldom handsome. The Poles look like their 
Russian kinsmen. They are dark-haired, fine-looking, 
and often distinguished in appearance and bearing. 
The Russian peasants, or mujiks, are a sad-faced 
people — weary, no doubt, with labor for many hours 
each day. There are sisters of charity from the con- 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



39 



vents, coarsely-robed monks, barefooted pilgrims on 
their way to some shrine, policemen everywhere, 
students from the university, wealthy aristocrats in 

elegant coaches with 
servants in livery, 
and shopkeepers eag- 
erly showing them 
their choicest wares. 

Many people are in 
uniform, for in Rus- 
sia every professional 
man, every civil 
officer, every railroad 
employe, and every 
student, even to the 
school boys and girls, 
must wear a uniform. 
Doctors, teachers, 
artists, dentists, civil 
engineers, all are in 
uniforms prescribed 
by law. 

Among the soldiers 
we are most inter- 
ested in the Cossacks, 
with their long dark blue coats, their trousers 
stuffed into, heavy cavalry boots, their sabers and guns, 
and their warrior air. The Cossacks inhabit south- 
eastern Russia. The men are born soldiers, tall, 
strong and fearless. The Cossack women are renowned 
for their beauty. As horsemen the Cossacks are not 
surpassed by any people Their children learn to ride 




THERE ARE POLICEMEN EVERYWHERE 



40 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

almost before they learn to walk; their babies' cradle 
songs are war songs. All their training is for a soldier's 
life. 

So no part of the Russian army is more important 
than the Cossack cavalry. All difficult scouting, 
sending of secret messages, sentinel duty, and the like 
is entrusted to the Cossacks in war time. Like Indians, 
they are quick to note signs of the enemy's presence, 
and are able to slip, undetected, across hostile territory, 
where no one else would venture. 

The Cossack's horse is almost a part of him. 
These men can ride in any posture, standing up, leaning 
low at the horse's side, lying upon his back, or as they 
will. The rider checks his horse with a motion when 
going at a frightful pace, reins him in at the point of 
a precipice, or silently guides him almost through 
the very camp of the enemy. 

Horse and rider have wonderful powers of endurance, 
never seeming to tire. They move so quickly and 
silently that the suddenness of their attack is terrible 
to the enemy. Sometimes in making an attack the 
Cossack flings himself to the ground, orders his horse 
to lie down in front of him, and resting his gun on the 
animal, fires from behind him as a breastwork. 

WINTER IN THE CITY 

We should like to visit St. Petersburg in winter. 
The czar returns from his summer palace; the nobility 
open their luxurious homes for the court season ; in the 
theaters and opera houses are nightly performances 
by the finest actors and singers in the world ; the shops 
are brilliant with lights, rich wares, and elegantly 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 41 

clad shoppers ; sleighs throng the streets and fly up and 
down the frozen Neva in bewildering confusion; and 
fun, frolic, and good cheer are in the very air. 

The Neva ice is the center of winter sports. Part 
of it is a broad ice road, covered by sleighs and sledges 
and chairs on runners. On part a railway is laid 
each winter from St. Petersburg to Kronstadt. And 
on still another part skaters in furs make merry by the 
hour. Rich folk are given to buying skates made of 
gold or silver. One may even see skates set with 
pearls and precious stones. Diamonds are sometimes 
used for adornment. Russians naturally skate well, 
but care less for such sport than for sleighing. Ice- 
hilling, an amusement akin to our tobogganing, is 
popular. The ice-hills are built of wood in the form 
of a long slide. An icy path is made by letting water 
freeze on the slide, and down this inclined plane sleds 
dash at a terrific speed. 

In January occurs the ceremony on the Neva 
called " blessing the waters." The czar, all the court 
officials, and the priests of the Greek Church gather 
at the Winter Palace and form a procession, which 
moves solemnly toward the middle of the river, on a 
carpeted board platform. In mid-stream a hole has 
been cut in the ice and a wooden temple built over 
it. The procession bearing lighted tapers arrives at 
the temple, where crowds have gathered to witness the 
ceremony. 

The priest immerses the cross in the icy river, blesses 
the stream, prays that it may enrich the soil and bring 
prosperity to the people, and sprinkles the people 
with the consecrated water. Many carry away bottles 




o 

I— I 

CO 
CO 

K 
O 

o 

Cu 
CO 

D 

O 

HH 

CD 

H 

H 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 43 

of the blessed water, believing it to have great power 
after, the ceremony. 

In country districts this " blessing of the waters" 
is believed by the superstitious peasants to rid them 
of evil spirits, water nixies, demons and the like. 

In the spring, when the Neva ice breaks up, there 
is another ceremony at the Winter Palace. The 
fortress cannon boom a salute from the island, and the 
commander of the fortress crosses the Neva in a boat, to 
carry to the czar at the Winter Place a goblet of Neva 
water. With much pomp he announces to the czar 
that the river is open to commerce. The czar drinks 
the water and fills the goblet with silver coin. 

Winter is a season of extravagant living in St. 
Petersburg. The capital is an expensive city in which 
to dwell, and the Russian aristocracy are reckless 
money-spenders. They entertain lavishly and expend 
fortunes on dress and in card-playing. Heavy eating 
and drinking, constant cigarette-smoking and drinking 
of tea, dances, theaters, operas, gambling — these are 
the diversions of wealthy Russians. Cards keep them 
occupied day and night, often run them into debt 
(for gambling is a part of card-playing), and are thrown 
aside only when the church services demand attention. 
Playing and praying are the chief occupations of a 
Russian, it has been said. 

Debt hangs over many a family of seeming wealth. 
Most of the great estates of the Russian nobility are 
heavily mortgaged, the money obtained being used 
for pleasures. 

The magnificent homes of these gay aristocrats 
have rooms crowded with costly furniture, paintings, 



44 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

and bric-a-brac; yet we learn with astonishment, from 
those who know, that the elegance is all for show; 
that private rooms are untidy; that beds go unmade, 
floors unswept, clothing unbrushed; and that slovenly 
habits are not unknown in the most aristocratic 
families. 

Hospitality is a Russian virtue. The samovar is 
always steaming in the drawing-room, that a chance 
guest may have a glass of delicious tea. The dining- 
table is loaded with good things. The host and hostess 
are ever ready with a cordial welcome. Educated 
Russians are brilliant talkers. They travel widely, 
speak several foreign languages (for Russians have a 
gift for languages), and are well read, in spite of the 
fact that they may not buy what books they wish, nor 
read all foreign papers. 

The Censor bars from sale in Russia so many books 
that were a Russian gentleman to buy for his library 
the works which men in our own country think most 
necessary for their libraries, he would be exiled to 
Siberia for life. Siberia has always been a land for 
exiles — criminals and political offenders. It has been 
called the " Russian Prison. " 

The Censor has all foreign periodicals examined 
and everything not to his taste is " blacked out/ 5 A 
foreign paper frequently appears in Russia with 
numerous blackened spaces. Of course everybody 
is then curious to find out what was printed under 
those black squares. Often people write to friends 
abroad to send them clippings of the paragraphs 
blacked out. This is dangerous, however, for if it 
should be found out, they would be arrested. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 45 

When one wishes to give a ball or party, in Russia, 
he must first ask permission of the police. The guests 
must always be guarded in their conversation, too, for 
members of the secret police are present, watching 
everyone. 

All public meetings for the discussion of any public 
subject whatever are forbidden in Russia. Sometimes 
the university students hold such a meeting in secret. 
But almost always the police discover the gathering, 
a riot follows, students are arrested wholesale, and a 
number of them may be sent to Siberia for several 
years of exile. 

PLEASURE TRIPS IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD 

The summer resorts, villas, and royal palaces along 
the Neva and the Gulf of Finland are the objective 
points of pleasant excursions for us. We visit the 
royal estate of Tsars-Koe-Selo, fifteen miles from the 
city. The first railroad in Russia extended from St. 
Petersburg to Tsars-Koe-Selo, and was built by 
Americans. Catherine II. beautified this royal palace 
and has her name written in amber all over the walls 
of the famous Amber Room. There are amber walls, 
chairs and tables, even amber chess-boards and chess- 
men in the Amber Room. Another room at Tsars-Koe- 
Selo is the Hall of Lapis-Lazuli. Siberian mines 
furnished lapis-lazuli walls for this room, while the 
floor is of ebony, set with a mother-of-pearl mosaic 
in a flower design. The park surrounding the palace 
is beautiful, but we are chiefly interested in the black 
swans on the lake. 

Peterhof is a summer residence which was built for 



46 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



Peter the Great on the south bank of the Neva. The 
palace stands on an eminence overlooking the Gulf of 
Finland, and has as its most interesting room an 
apartment decorated for Catherine II. by an Italian 
artist. The walls are paneled with portraits of beauti- 
ful young women — 
eight hundred and 
sixty-three pictures 
— each lovely maid 
being represented in 
a different pose. 
Peterhof is celebrat- 
ed for its splendid 
fountains and water- 
works, which are 
almost equal in won- 
der to those at Ver- 
sailles in France. 

Returning in a 
troika from Peter- 
hof, we order our 
" cabby " to take us 
to a Russian restaur- 
ant. The restaurant 
has a picture sign 
showing different 
articles of food. So 

few of the Russian people can read that shops often 
have picture signs. A sign showing coats and trousers 
is at the tailor's; one showing books we see at the 
book-shop; pictures of cabbages and turnips are 
displayed at the grocer's, and pictures of knives 




A FLOOR RUBBER 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 47 

and cutlery at the hardware dealer's. Entering the 
restaurant, we find ourselves in a large room rilled 
with people drinking tea from glasses. Each table has 
a samovar steaming in the center, and each tea-drinker 
has his glass filled and refilled while he munches a 
lump of sugar between sips of tea. 

The waiter serves us with stchie, the regular soup of 
the people. It is made of half -fermented cabbage, 
chopped with cold boiled mutton and flavored with 
butter, salt, barley and various herbs. The poorest 
peasants use linseed oil instead of butter. Another 
national dish served us is borsch. This is cabbage 
soup colored with beets and having other vegetables 
swimming in it. It is thickened with sour cream and 
eaten with a side dish of roasted buckwheat. A 
common beverage is kvas, made of fermented barley 
meal and honey. 

We taste a soup of cold beer in which float bits of 
meat and cucumber. Delicious white bread is set 
before us, and there is black ryebread also. The fish 
pies make our mouths water, but we do not enjoy all 
of these Russian dishes at the first trial. 

A RAILWAY JOURNEY 

All Russian railway stations are large, well-built 
structures, surrounded by grassy lawns, adorned with 
flowers. Every station building was blessed by the 
priest before it was open for use. And in every one 
is an icon with a lamp burning before it. Russians 
always kneel before the icon and cross themselves 
before buying their railroad tickets. 

We are shown to our places in the train by an official 






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A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 49 

wearing a black uniform, high boots, astrakhan cap, 
and a silver badge on his breast showing the Russian 
double eagle. The Government owns most of the 
railroads. Our train has first, second and third class 
coaches, as good as the best in Europe, while the 
first-class sleepers are better than those one finds in 
France. In the dining-car meals are served at any 
time, always with the same queer collection of dishes. 
One could not tell from the food served whether he 
was eating breakfast, luncheon, dinner, or late supper. 

Travel is very, very slow. The stops are long and 
tedious. Often the passengers are none too clean, and it 
is disagreeable to have to be near them. Even people 
of the better classes may have soiled hands, carelessly 
kept clothing, and a look of having economized on 
soap and towels. Yet there are no pleasanter, better- 
natured people than the Russians; and we enjoy 
making their acquaintance. All seem friendly to 
Americans, for American capital and American brains 
have been freely used in developing Russian industries. 
The first railways were built by Americans, and the 
Russian engines are still built like those in our own 
country. 

We grow weary of the scenes from our car windows. 
Mile after mile we travel, seeing only monotonous 
plains, or long stretches of dreary forest, or great 
grain-fields; then more plains, more forest, more lonely 
fields. In southern Russia one could travel a week by 
railroad and see only wheat-fields. 

We pass through no cities, but see now and then 
a shabby hamlet or a village. The poor little huts 
built of logs and thatched with straw stand in a 



50 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

forlorn row on either side of a wagon road. The road 
is often a mere trail across the flat country, along 
which a peasant's cart travels with difficulty, sinking 
deep in mire or sand. The villagers about the railway 
station have coarse black hair, narrow, bead-like eyes, 
and low, furrowed brows. They wear rough clothing of 
homespun (or sheep-skin, in winter). For stockings, 
rags are tied about their legs; and sandals do duty 
for shoes. Even among the village children one 
seldom sees a bright, happy face. 

Better villages have larger izbas. (A peasant's 
house is called an izba.) There is a white church, too 
with green roof, gilded dome and glittering cross. 
Sometimes a monastery, with clustered domes and 
many crosses, is seen in the distance, its bells sounding 
clear and sweet when the train pauses. Russia is the 
land of sweet-toned bells. 

One of our fellow passengers/ has been the full length 
of Russia's longest railroad, the Trans-Siberian, which 
extends from Moscow to Vladivostok on the Pacific 
Ocean. A branch leads from a point near Vladivostok 
down through Manchuria to the Russian seaport of 
Dalny. It took thirteen days of constant traveling 
to make the trip by rail from Dalny to Moscow. 

Our friend tells us much of this wonderful trip 
across Siberia, of the monotonous level lands where the 
railroad points straight ahead like an arrow, while the 
lonely open steppes spread out on either side like the 
ocean; of the magnificent trains built for these long 
Trans-Siberian journeys, made up of sleeping, parlor 
and dining cars, with libraries, writing-tables, pianos, 
bathrooms with hot and cold water, and even a little 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 51 

gymnasium for people who wish to stretch themselves 
on the long runs between stops. He says that soon 
it is hoped to increase the speed of the trains so that 
the journey from Vladivostok to Moscow will take but 
eight days. 

Another important Russian railroad is the line from 
the southern shore of the Caspian Sea to Samarkand 
in central Asia, called the Trans-Caspian Railway. 

We leave the train at one of the stops, to take 
luncheon in the station restaurant. The station 
is a handsome brick building, and the restaurant is a 
delight to hungry travelers. Every dish is properly 
cooked, piping hot, and well served, while the price 
for this excellent meal is but a ruble. Such good 
things one always finds in Russian railway restaurants ! 

From here we take a carriage for a seventy-mile 
drive across the country to the estate of a Russian 
gentleman. We wish to see the farm lands. 

RUSSIA A GREAT FARM 

The Russian Empire has been called the biggest 
farm on earth. While large sections of the country 
are barren wastes and vast morasses, and millions of 
acres are left uncultivated, there are enough farm 
lands left to keep eighty million people busy tilling 
the soil. The most productive grain lands lie between 
the Baltic Ocean and the Black Sea, extending east- 
ward from Prussia and Austria to the Volga. Rye, 
wheat, barley, oats, hemp, flax, tobacco and sugar- 
beets are raised in such quantities that Russia is 
called the granary of Europe. 

The czar owns about one-third of all the land. The 



52 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

peasants own almost as much as the czar — in land 
granted them by the Government when they were 
freed from serfdom. And the nobles own a little less 
than the peasants. 

When the serfs were freed, each peasant family 
received enough land for its support, on condition 
that the Government should be paid for this land 
in yearly installments. The peasants were granted 
many years in which to pay for their little farms 
(about thirty acres for each family), and some have 
now finished these payments. But most of them are 
still struggling with their debt. No longer does each 
family own thirty acres. As the sons married, the 
farm was divided for each new family. Thus a 
peasant's farm is now but a tiny strip. 

Meantime, as the Government had paid a big price 
bo the nobles for these peasant lands, it was hoped the 
nobles would use their new-gotten wealth in improving 
their great estates. Many Russian nobles own estates 
of from fifteen to twenty thousand acres. If these 
immense farms were rightly cultivated, think how 
rich and prosperous Russia would be ! But the nobles, 
in most cases, have spent their money in foreign 
travel and luxurious living in Moscow and St. Peters- 
burg. So their lands still need enriching, and no 
money is left with which to do it. 

We learn all these facts about farms as we drive 
across the country behind a team of strong Russian 
horses, with jingling bells on their yoke. Long country 
drives in Russia are not a pleasure. This road is a 
sandy tract, into the loose soil of which our carriage 
sinks to the axle. It is like traveling through soft 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 53 

snow. Where forests border our way, we find small 
branches of trees strewn over the road to make a 
more solid foothold for the horses. 

Now and then we come to a lazy stream (Russia 
is so nearly level that all its streams are lazy), and 
the bridge upon which we cross makes us fear an 
upset. The bridge is formed of untrimmed pine poles 
laid cross-wise upon two heavy pieces of timber. The 
poles project on either side far beyond the beams 
on which they are laid, and as no parapet guards 
the sides, a heavy carriage which failed to cross exactly 
in the middle of the bridge would tip into the stream 
below. 

Many times we cross these rude bridges, and often 
we get out and walk, when the road, with its covering 
of branches, becomes too rough. Sometimes it is 
necessary to drive over moorland or meadow, quitting 
the sandy road entirely. 

For miles on miles we toil through forests, past fields, 
across moors, and beside streams. We stay over 
night in a village inn, a poor little cabin with mud 
floors, bad odors, a group of noisy peasants drinking 
about a table, and with beds which are but hard 
bunks in a shed opening into the stable. In the night 
a pig strays into our room, while a rooster, perched 
on the foot of our bunk, wakes us with his midnight 
crowing. 

We drive all the next day. One must carry sup- 
plies with him on these wearisome rides. We have 
cushions, rugs, a basket of edibles, plates, knives, forks, 
and a teapot. A camp fire by the roadside boils 
our tea-kettle. 



54 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

At last we reach the country house of our friend. 
Although it is almost nine o'clock at night, the field 
hands are just returning from work; and it is light 
enough out of doors to read a newspaper. 

The country house is a large wooden dwelling of one 
story, with walls vastly thick, ceilings so high that 
we feel lonely, rooms large and rather barely furnished, 
windows double to keep out the bitter winter cold 
(though now they are wide open), and stoves of 
porcelain, huge enough to warm the whole estate, 
we should imagine. 

The stoves are built into the rooms and reach 
almost to the ceiling. Our host says that they keep 
the house at an even, warm temperature during the 
coldest days in winter. Little ventilation is possible 
during cold weather because of the tight double 
windows, though one pane of glass may be opened 
a short time to purify the air. 

Every room has its icon, before which candles burn. 
On entering the room each member of the family 
bows before the icon and makes the sign of the cross. 

Russian nobles dislike country life and make no 
effort to beautify their country homes as do the 
English people. Why, they ask, should they fill 
their houses with rare furnishings, pictures and books, 
when the buildings are of wood and may soon perish 
by decay or fire? Forest fires are frequent in Russia, 
and dwellings may easily be destroyed. 

The English, who love country life, build large 
houses of stone which last for centuries. Here they 
gather treasures and live their happiest days. Rus- 
sians spend only the busy summer upon their estates. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



55 



For the winter they 
rush away to the cap- 
ital, to lose in feasting, 
gambling, and other 
foolish pleasures all 
the money their har- 
vests have brought 
them. 

An army of ser- 
vants and laborers 
dwell in villages on 
this estate. There is 
much to do : plowing, 
sowing, and reaping 
for the field laborers ; 
cheese and butter 
making in the great 
clean dairy; the pre- 
serving and drying of 
fruits both for winter 
use and for sale (for 
Russian dried and candied fruits, packed in pretty 
baskets, are largely exported to other countries); 
the making of great barrels of fermented cabbage 
for the winter's supply of cabbage soup, and the 
preparation of barrels of kvas (the fermented barley 
drink), which are stored in the large cellar beneath 
the house. 

Fuel must be cut and cloth must be spun and made 
into garments for the servants. A crowd of people 
must be fed daily in the family's dining-hall and 
that of the servants. The big brick-paved kitchen 




A RUSSIAN NURSE 



56 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

is as busy a place as a factory, for the family is large, 
there are often guests, and the house-servants fill 
long tables in their own quarters. 

We are shown a colony of out-buildings where the 
cattle and horses are housed, and the farm machinery 
is kept. On these large estates the best modern 
agricultural machinery is beginning to be used. Not 
all Russian estate owners are thriftless. Many now 
buy German or English steam thrashers, besides 
cultivators, drills, sulky plows, harrows and the like. 
American-made machinery is also used. We see that 
the mowers, reapers, rakes, and all small tools on 
this estate are of the best modern make. 

But our host says that for the most part the farm 
tools and methods of work used in Russia are as rude 
as those described in the Bible. Grain is sowed 
broadcast by hand and is thrashed in any one of 
several old-fashioned ways: either by flails, by hulling 
it by hand or foot, or by the tread of horses and cattle. 
Millions of bushels are thrashed by driving carts 
over the grain as it comes from the fields. 

The plow may be a heavy two-wheeled wooden 
plow, or a poor affair with two iron shares but no 
point, or even but a wooden stick. Of course such 
a plow merely scratches the earth, making the soil 
yield but little. 

Our host explains the cause of the frequent famines 
in certain parts of Russia. He says that the farmers 
overwork the soil. They neglect to change their 
crops from year to year, which is just as hard on the 
soil as the use of but one set of muscles year after 
year would be on the human body. In this way 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



57 



the soil is worn out. But even when the soil is good, 
the summers may often be all too short to harvest 
the crops. Too soon winter sweeps down upon the 

fields, destroy- 
ing all that the 
summer toil has 
won. 

The hardest 
field work is 
turned over to 
the peasant wo- 
men. They hoe, 
dig, spade th.e 
earth, and cut 
grain and hay 
with sickles and 
scythes. We see 
them bending 
low over their 
tasks, their 
faces sad and 
deeply furrowed 
with care, while 
not far away under a tree or a little covering of leafy 
boughs their babies sleep on the ground. Such ex- 
posure of tiny babies — some perhaps but a few 
days old — often results in their death. In rural 
Russia, we learn, eight out of ten children die be- 
fore they reach ten years of age. Only the strong 
babies live, it seems. 

We see women riding astride horses, often without 
saddles. They pitch hay like men; and even girls 




TOLSTOI, THE PEASANTS' FRIEND 



58 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

do all manner of rough labor. All the women and 
gills wear short skirts. Here are some girls who 
appear very contented with their tasks. They wear 
bright red cotton skirts, some have on white chemisettes, 
and all wear aprons heavily embroidered. On their 
feet are sandals, while rags are tied on for stockings. 
Their hats are clumsy looking turbans, or perhaps 
shawls or kerchiefs knotted over the hair. 

Farm hands often work fourteen hours a day. 
Summer daylight is so long that the peasants set out 
for the fields at four o'clock in the morning, not re- 
turning until eight or nine at night. Slowly they 
plod homeward, singing some harvest chorus, perhaps. 
How much have they earned that day? If men, 
perhaps twenty-five cents. If girls, maybe but ten 
cents. 

In spite of poor tools, poor farming, low wages, and 
short summers, Russia in Europe produces 2,000,000,- 
000 bushels of grain a year. Rye, which furnishes 
the bread of the people, is the chief crop, about 
735,000,000 bushels being raised yearly. 

This estate has across it a zig-zag trail of small 
potato and cabbage gardens and tiny fields of flax 
and rye. These are the peasant lands. The Govern- 
ment granted to the freed serfs the very lands they 
dwelt upon, together with their villages, at the time 
they were freed. Often this took a zig-zag strip 
out of the best part of a noble's estate. Each peasant 
raises on his bit of land enough grain and flax to feed 
and clothe his family. 

All Russians live in villages, towns, or cities. Rus- 
sian peasants not only cling together in villages, 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 59 

but they hire out in gangs, work in groups, travel 
in groups, and if they migrate, even migrate by whole 
villages. We shall visit their villages by and by. 

Our host seems to have no neighbors. Large land- 
owners cannot have neighbors. The estates are so vast 
on account of forests, waste lands, bogs, lakes, moors, 
and immense tracts of peasant lands that a country 
noble must ride days to reach his nearest neighbor. 

Then the roads are wretched; and in winter the 
cold is so intense that a sledge ride across country 
is as much of a hardship as an arctic expedition. One 
must put on several suits of heavy clothing, bundle 
in furs, have a foot warmer, provide food and cover- 
ings against a night in the snow-drifts, and run the 
risk of being eaten by wolves. 

European Russia is said to be infested by about 
175,000 wolves. They are fierce little beasts when 
hungry, and to a sledge party making its lonely way 
across the great wastes of snow their cry brings terror. 
One hundred and fifty human beings perish annually 
from wolves. Cattle, sheep, and dogs are devoured 
by the hundred thousand on the cold plains and 
steppes. In the forests there are still some bears, 
but these are not dangerous to human life. No 
wonder, in view of all these drawbacks, that most 
Russian nobles leave their estates through the winter 
for life in the cities. 

Some old-time customs of the peasants on our 
host's estate interest us. We remember that the 
Russians are Slavs, the Slavs being a family of tribes 
which in the early centuries settled northeastern 
Europe. Slav traits often appear in these people. 



60 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

Once we discover our hostess rebuking a maid 
servant. The mistress speaks sharply, while the 
maid sinks to the ground, clinging to her mistress' skirts 
and kissing her feet. We think this a very serious 
trouble, but find that such outbursts are frequent and 
are quickly over. The foot-kissing is only a relic of 
serfdom; and the mistress' hasty temper forbodes 
no cruelty. The Russians are quick-tempered, but 
quick to forgive also. 

To one custom belonging to days of serfdom, the older 
peasant men and women still cling. When they have 
a request to make of their master and mistress, they 
come at evening to the lawn before the piazza and 
there stand humbly waiting the appearance of our 
host. He steps out upon the piazza, and the peasant, 
removing his cap and bowing low, tells his story, 
making his request. It all seems very quaint to us, 
quite as though our host were a king. 

A RUSSIAN BATH 

The Russian creed requires bathing every Saturday, 
and so the peasant is sure to be clean once a week, 
but does not devote much time to scrubbing himself 
between times. He sleeps at night in the clothes he 
wears by day, and often contents himself with a dry rub. 

And no wonder. A Russian bath is a heroic way 
to become clean. The little Russian is first steamed 
until he is almost cooked, in a hole under the stove, 
or in one of the vapor baths to be found in all the 
villages. Then pailfuls of hot water are poured over 
him, followed by pails of ice-cold water; or else he is 
tumbled out into the snow. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 61 

Near the dwelling of our host is a bath-house. 
Russian steam baths are famous; so we decide to 
try one. The bather slips off his clothing in the 
dressing-room and enters the large bathroom, where 
an attendant dashes buckets of hot water upon him, 
one after the other, as long as he can stand it. Then 
the attendant flagellates (whips) the bather all over 
with little pine branches until the skin is blood-red. 
Next he spreads fresh pine leaves on the brick floor, 
which is really the brick roof of a furnace, and bids 
the bather stand on this, while more buckets of hot 
water are dashed upon him, the steam rising in clouds 
about him until he can hardly gasp. He is then 
taken aside and scrubbed with soap-suds and a pine 
brush, while he wonders that he has any skin left to 
be scrubbed. 

But the attendant now begins all over again, bathing, 
scrubbing and steaming him a second time, and 
finishing off by dashing buckets of cold water (not 
quite ice-cold) upon him. The cold water comes 
upon him with such force, however, that he cannot 
tell whether it is very hot or very cold. We are 
told that in winter bathers run home through snow- 
drifts, carrying most of their clothing under their 
arms. Such a bath is said to be very stimulating; 
but we are willing to do without this remarkable 
tonic for the rest of our lives. 

VILLAGE LIFE 

Because Russians will not dwell apart in solitary 
homes, but must always live near their fellow men, 
Russia is an empire of villages. We are told that 



62 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

there are 500,000 villages in European Russia alone. 
To us they all look alike, but in different parts of the 
country the huts are built of different materials. 
In the northern forest region, the houses are of logs. 
In the South they are of sun-dried brick. 

On a distant corner of our host's estate we find a 
tiny hamlet of about fifty log cabins, set among dreary 
fields. The villagers' only view is of bogs and scrubby 
pine forests. The cabins stand at irregular intervals 
along either side of the road, which here is like a 
wide, dirty street. Some cabins have a lean-to at 
the back, and one has two stories, but the rest are 
but square huts, about eight feet high from ground 
to roof, made of rough pine logs mortised at the 
corners, with the spaces between filled with moss 
and mud. The roofs are thatched with straw or 
moss. In the spring these moss-thatched roofs often 
show a thick sprinkling of wild flowers which have 
bloomed from chance seeds in the moss. 

We see no beauty of flowers now. The little garden 
patches with their cabbages and potatoes are but 
ugly little plots. The unpainted cabins are grimy 
with smoke and rain. Horses, cows, pigs, and chickens 
live under the family roof, and in winter must make 
these huts wretchedly filthy. Where the road or 
doo^ards have miry puddles, pigs wallow freely, 
while nearly every cabin has a savage dog which 
snarls at our heels. 

Not far from this hamlet is the church, a white- 
painted building with green-painted plank roof, and 
a spire surmounted by a cross. Of course there are 
no pews or seats in this little wooden church. We enter, 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 63 

first pausing to look at the rude icon which is over 
the doorway. 

The priest is within, an old man with long, flowing 
hair, tall felt hat of queer shape, and full sweeping 
robe. His life is a hard one. He must hold endless 
services, baptize babies, marry the young folk, bury 
the dead, bless the houses, the harvests, the waters, 
the coming and going, the sorrowing and rejoicing 
of every member of his flock. He is not often loved 
or respected, as we should suppose. His life is a 
lonely one. He must be married, but if his wife 
dies, he must retire to a monastery and never marry 
again. If anything goes wrong in the village, he 
is likely to be blamed, for should he not have pre- 
vented mishaps by prayers and fasts? The villagers 
trust absolutely in his religious rites and ceremonies, 
for they are superstitious, but it is often the case that 
they care little for the priest. 

We enter a poor little hut. The floor is of mud, 
the windows are small and tightly closed, and a clutter 
of old farming tools and harness is the only furniture. 
But this is the storeroom, we find. Behind it is 
the one real room of the house. Here the family 
cooks, eats, sleeps and works. 

The chief piece of furniture is a brick stove which 
rises almost to the ceiling and fills about one-fourth 
of the room. On the top of this stove the various 
members of the family sleep in winter, lying down 
in the clothing which they wear in the daytime and 
huddling close together to keep warm. When they 
do not sleep on the stove, they sleep on the floor, or 
in bunks around the wall. 



64 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

In winter these peasants' clothing is of sheepskin 
with the wool turned inside, and as these garments 
are not changed or washed, the average peasant is 
filthy in the extreme. 

Aside from the brick stove in this hut we are visiting, 
there is scanty furniture. A table, a bench, some 
stools and a few boxes are all one sees. In one corner 
hangs an icon. This one is a picture of the Virgin. 
Beneath it a lamp burns. To keep that lamp burning, 
the peasant will save his olive oil, using for his own 
food common linseed oil. People who live in cold 
climates must have oily food of some kind.' But 
the icon lamp must first be fed, in Russia. 

Now this icon is the family altar, and when one 
steps into the room he bares his head, crosses himself, 
and says a prayer before it. Every room in a Russian 
home is sanctified. About once a month the priest 
with two assistants enters every house in his parish, 
sprinkles the rooms with holy water, cleanses them 
with prayer, and signs them with the cross. 

If we stayed for a meal at this home we should 
sit on a bench with the family, before the rude table. 
A big bowl of cabbage soup set in the middle of the 
table is always the chief dish. Into it each of us 
would dip with a wooden spoon, carrying the soup 
to his mouth. A tray of ryebread ("black bread") and 
a jug of kvas are the remaining items on the peasant's 
usual bill of fare. Smoked fish, dried herring, sour 
cabbage, and cucumbers are very much enjoyed also. 

Vodka, a strong liquor distilled from corn, is the 
drink which has always been a curse to Russian 
peasants. Every village has its drink-shop where 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 65 

this fiery liquor is sold. But lately the Government 
has undertaken to do away with intemperance by 
manufacturing a diluted vodka, which is sold now in 
certain amounts 1 only. 

Other villages which we visit are larger, having 
from a few hundred to a thousand inhabitants. The 
homes are better, with several rooms, perhaps, and 
a comfortable living-room where before the big stone 
chimney a samovar steams, while the men-folk sit 
about it drinking glasses of hot tea, with a bottle 
of vodka to add to the cheer. 

In larger villages there is a better church, a school, 
and an inn, and at one end of the place we see a long 
building, a much larger one than the rest, which 
forms the village work-shop, or factory. The best 
dwelling in the village is sure to be the home of the 
starosta, an officer elected by his fellow villagers to 
act as chief man — a kind of mayor. The starosta 
has much power. With his council of village peasants 
about him, he lays down the law for the village. He 
can, by vote of the council, order any villager flogged, 
put out of town, or exiled to Siberia. 

But what is made in the village factory? we ask. 
A Russian friend tells us about the thriving cottage 
and village industries of Russia. 

COTTAGE INDUSTRIES 

So small has the allowance of land for each peasant 
family now become that it will not support even a 
small family. So the peasants spend their winter 
months making articles for sale. 

Millions of Russian farm laborers spend their winters 



66 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

making shoes, shawls, lace, wooden spoons, knives, 
locks, razors, metal icons, paper-mache articles, and 
cheap toys. Every little cottage has its loom, or 
turning lathe, or work-bench. Father, mother, and 
children all work, often from five o'clock in the morning 
until nine at night. And although these Russian 
peasants are as skillful as any laboring people in the 
world, they work for the lowest pay. Goods are 
sold at so low a price in this country that if each 
of the family makes a few cents a day, he is quite 
satisfied. 

Large city firms and foreign dealers order goods 
from these cottage toilers early in the season, for 
so well are the articles made that there is a ready 
demand for them not only in Russia but also in other 
European countries and even in Asia. 

These cottage industries, as they are called, have 
trained the people in useful handicraft, have made 
them independent bread-winners, and have been the 
beginning of many little village factories, called 
cooperative associations. For these factories the 
peasants of a village club together and build a large 
shop, which they fit up with tools, machinery, looms, 
or whatever is needful for their work. Then they 
appoint a leader to get orders for them from large 
firms, and to direct their work. All winter" long 
they keep at their tasks, as busy as bees in a hive. 
The leader pays all expenses and receives all the 
money. At the close of the season the profits are 
divided among the workers. 

We enter the village factory, where the villagers 
are making icons for sale, turning them out by the 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



67 



thousand. These are not the richly jeweled, gold 
and silver icons such as we saw in St. Petersburg. 
The face and hands of the saint, Virgin, or Saviour 
are crudely painted. The rest of the picture is in 
raised work of paper-mache. Sometimes the raised 
work is of brass. These pictures sell for from a few 
cents to many dollars, according to their size and 
workmanship. And they sell wherever there is a 
Greek Church, whether in Russia or in foreign lands. 

Every village in Russia is busy during the winter, 
making articles to sell at home and abroad. We see 

village factories 
where they are mak- 
ing cheap wall clocks, 
and looking-glasses, 
and where they are 
weaving silk or linen. 
Calf-skin boots are 
made by the million 
pairs. They are good 
boots, too. Leather 
is made by the vil- 
lagers, both in their 
homes and in their 
little factories. More 
than a million dol- 
lars' worth of leather 
is made in a year. 
The leather known 
as russia-leather was 
originally a specialty 

RUSSIAN BASKET SELLER °f Russia, bllt the 




68 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

best russia-leather is now made in Austria. Lace 
is made by the hundred million yards. Russian 
peasants wear a great deal of coarse lace. The 
men have it on their best shirts, and the women deck 
their dresses and aprons with it. In one group of 
provinces of European Russia there are said to be 
thirty thousand people engaged in making lace. 
Every year they make over 500,000,000 yards; and 
not all of it is coarse lace. Some of the patterns are 
fine and delicate. 

With so many good workmen in these Russian 
villages, it is not strange that great factories have 
been established all over the country. Wherever 
labor is skillful and cheap, big factories are certain to 
be opened. A boy or girl who has worked in the 
home cottage from early childhood and has spent a 
few years, in a village factory, is easily taught to do 
the work of a great manufacturing establishment. 

Children usually get about eight cents a day in these 
large factories. Like their elders, they must work 
long hours for this poor pay. But they have many 
holidays, for the factories must close for every fast 
and saint's day in the Greek Church. And there are 
about a dozen of these holidays for every month in 
the year. Recent laws have ordered that all large 
factories outside of towns must provide schools for 
the children, besides free hospitals, baths, and libraries 
for all their laborers. 

Russia has' great natural resources. Her coal fields 
are the largest in the world. Her oil wells in the 
Baku district of the Caucasus out-yield those of the 
LTnited States. Iron lies buried in rich deposits in 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 69 

the Ural Mountains and Siberia. With forests, grain 
fields, waters abounding in fish, the steppes of Eastern 
Russia overrun by immense herds of cattle — what 
more does Russia need to make it leap to the head as 
the chief industrial country? It has only begun to 
live as a modern, civilized, prosperous nation. Time 
to develop its resources is all that the czar's land 
needs, with more freedom for the people, more good 
schools, and better laws. 

RUSSIAN CHILD LIFE 

Our young friend Ivan (Ivan is the Russian for 
John) has a little sister named Anna. They know a 
wee bit of English, and we know a few Russian phrases. 
So we get on famously as friends. The first thing 
we notice about these Russian children is their religion. 
Each has a guardian angel, or patron saint; and to 
these saints they pray many times a day. 

Over their beds hang excellent icons of their saints. 
They believe their "Angels," as they call these saints, 
are always watching them,. Ivan tells us all about his 
religious duties, and it seems to us that these must 
take up a greater part of his time. He must keep 
a light burning day and night before the icon over his 
bed. A priest has consecrated the picture by reciting 
prayers before it, and Ivan himself always kneels 
before it and makes the sign of the cross on entering 
his room. The boy was baptized when he was but 
eight days old and was confirmed in the Greek Church 
immediately after baptism. 

Baptism in the Greek Church is a long, long cere- 
mony. Sometimes it lasts several days. The baby 



70 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

is anointed with oil, signed with the cross, immersed 
three times in water, and blessed by the priest. Often 
Russian children are named in honor of their patron 
saint. 

Ivan celebrates the day dedicated to his "Angel," 
and invites us to his house for the occasion. What 
Ivan does is what every man, woman and child in 
the Greek Church is expected to do in honor of his 
own guardian angel. 

On his Angel's day Ivan does not work, but, dressed 
in his best clothes, goes to church, where he kneels 
before his Angel's shrine, touches his little head to 
the ground, says long prayers, and kisses the floor 
beneath the icon. Then he buys from the priest 
some consecrated loaves of bread to give to the poor. 
On returning home, he finds a feast spread, and all 
his friends and relatives there to help him celebrate 
the day. Everybody kisses him, and does reverence 
to the Angel's picture, and dines at the generously 
loaded table. After dinner, and a little gossip, the 
people all go home to their various tasks, only to come 
back for another hearty meal in the evening. It 
is a great day for Ivan. Anna celebrates her Angel's 
day in the same way. 

The children fast many days every year, just as do 
their parents. During Lent no butter, eggs, fish or 
meat may be eaten, and only young children may 
drink milk. There are other long fasts, before Christ- 
mas, in August, and on saints' days. Every Wednes- 
day and Friday of the whole year one must fast. Men 
folk make up for all this fasting by drinking much 
vodka, but it is hard on the children. Indeed, when 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 71 

the fasts are over, everybody eats such a quantity of 
food that often many are made sick. 

Ivan and Anna have prayers to repeat at school, 
and many of them. There are certain prayers when 
the term begins, others when the holidays come, still 
other prayers, when a new teacher is engaged, and 
others for use on the playground, in the workshop, 
the factory, and on the farm. Religion goes with 
every act of their lives. 

As in every country, the education of a Russian 
child depends upon his parents' position in life. The 
peasant girls rarely go to school. The boys go only 
in the winter when they are unable to be of help to 
their parents. 

The school buildings of the poor villages are miser- 
able huts, without ventilation. Each pupil is bound 
to bring some wood to school, to heat the building. 
When it is very cold the pupils do not go to school. 
Each family in turn boards the schoolmaster. 

In many of the villages the teachers are paid less 
than the shepherds, and are not respected or well cared 
for. They are often very ignorant themselves, and a 
great part of the time are drunk, even while in the 
schoolroom. Much of the actual teaching is done by 
the older pupils. 

School-children always wear uniforms; so do school- 
teachers. The cloth, the color, the cut, of the gar- 
ments, even the size and number of buttons on them, 
are fixed, and whether the dress is becoming or not 
to Ivan, or his sister Anna, they must wear it. 

In the poorest villages very often nobody cares 
whether the children attend school or not. Boys and 



72 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

girls idle about, or earn their own living with only a 
day now and then at school. Their uniforms get rag- 
ged, books are mislaid, school is all but closed. 

Then word reaches the village that the School In- 
spector is coming, and what a sensation there is! All 
the brightest boys and girls are hustled off to school, 
good uniforms are borrowed from a neighboring town, 
the children are drilled in a good lesson all around, 
everything is rubbed up and made to look its best. 
The School Inspector is really delighted with his visit. 
If he suspects that all this splendor will fade as soon 
as he rides away, he gives no sign. 

But good village schools are now being opened. The 
czar is making an effort to improve the common 
schools. Besides the regular studies, children are 
learning useful occupations. Some village primary 
schools, have school-gardens or fields where boys and 
girls learn modern methods of gardening and farming. 
Bee-keeping, silk-worm culture, trades and various 
handicrafts are being taught. These schools are for 
the peasants. 

Children of the aristocracy are either taught at home 
by well-trained governesses and tutors, or they attend 
the convent schools established by the government in 
the leading cities. They are taught " accomplish- 
ments" — to have fine manners, to dance, to speak 
modern languages, and to sing, play, and be fashion- 
able ladies and gentlemen. They are permitted to go 
to the theater and the opera, to take part in the carnival 
sports before Lent, and are even allowed, perhaps, to 
attend a breakfast at the palace, given by the czarina. 
The older boys who stand highest in their class are 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



73 




A RUSSIAN FAMILY OF ARCHANGEL 



taken to court receptions, to act as pages to the ladies. 
Russian children have few games and care little for 
out-door sports. They think ice-hilling great fun; 
and they are good skaters by nature. They sing well, 
and on holidays one sees them parading the village 
streets with their elders — men and bo} r s in one line, 
women and girls in another — singing choruses. Some- 
times on holidays all the villagers sit on benches out- 



74 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

side their cabins, singing together in a great chorus. 
When several Russians are together they fill the air 
with music. The people sing at their tasks, while 
tramping to the fields, while gathering fuel in the forest, 
or while pushing their boats across lake or stream. 

The children look forward with delight to their fairs 
and festivals, of which there are many. The first of 
these is in Easter week. This is followed by the 
festival of the river nymphs. Then comes a festival 
in honor of John the Baptist; then a harvest feast, 
and George's Day, which is celebrated twice a year, 
on the 23d of April and the 26th of November. 

Later come the Christmas and New Year's festivals 
and the great Russian Carnival or Butter week, which 
ends the winter's festivals. At these fairs and festivals 
the Russians amuse themselves much as do the people 
in other parts of the world at festivals. The main 
square of the city is given up to booths where candy 
and sweetmeats are sold. There are fortune-tellers, 
and merry-go-rounds, and swings, and shows, and 
theaters, and (in winter) sleigh-drives. Clowns go 
about disguised in wigs and peasant dress, and with 
their jokes and antics add to the fun. 

The Russians are very kind-hearted and polite and 
they are fond of their children. One seldom hears a 
cross word or any quarreling among them, even in 
the great crowds at the fairs. The brothers and sisters 
of a family are devoted to one another and to their 
parents. 

The courtesy Russian children show toward their 
parents, and their consideration for older people, are 
always noticed by travelers. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 75 

CHRISTMAS IN RUSSIA 

Christmas holidays in Russia begin at sunset on 
Christmas Eve and last twelve days, until the festival 
of Epiphany. At sunset of Christmas Eve children, 
and older people, too, go about the town singing carols 
under the windows of the nobles and other great folk. 
At the head of their procession is carried a pole, on 
top of which is a bright "Star' of Bethlehem." 
Showers of coins are thrown the singers from the win- 
dows, in return for their carols. Often after singing 
their songs before a house, the boys and girls enter, to 
congratulate . the family on the arrival of Christmas 
and to wish them a happy New Year. This is a village 
custom. 

After the carols everyone dresses in the guise of 
sheep, oxen, and cattle, in memory of the scenes a- 
round the Christ Child's manger, and as the evening 
star appears supper is served on tables covered with 
straw. "Mumming" is a favorite frolic in country 
places. "Mummers" are mischievous young folks 
disguised as bears, goats, clowns, blind beggars, and 
thieves. They wear masks and go about to various 
homes where parties of young people are gathered, 
bursting into the room and performing all kinds of 
antics. The bears and goats dance together, the clowns 
iell stories and recite nonsense verses about those 
present, while the blind beggars (called Lazaruses) 
sing their "dismal dumps so dull and heavy," and the 
thieves pretend to have broken into the house to steal 
valuables. 

There is an uproar of merriment at such times; nor 
is "mumming" a frolic of the common people only. 



76 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 




CATHEDRAL AT OSTANKLNO, NEAR MOSCOW 
(Russian Drosbky in Foreground) 



Even among the upper classes young people dress in 
disguise and go from house to house. 

At Christmas time the people greet one another 
with, "A happy feast to you!" And a happy feast 
it usually is. At dinner on Christmas Day is served 
a huge pyramid of rice, with raisins, blessed at the 
church. Every servant receives a useful gift, and the 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 77 

peasants on the estates generally offer gifts of em- 
broidery to the lady of the castle, and receive presents 
in return. The poor are always fed on Christmas Day. 

Santa Claus does not go to Russia. An old woman 
known as Baboushka takes his place and carries the 
children their gifts. 

Christmas trees , with their lighted candles, presents, 
and good wishes, are a part of the Christmas Eve 
celebration. On Christmas Day the churches, bril- 
liantly lighted and crowded with worshipers, hold long 
services, when the priests appear in their most gorgeous 
robes and the choirs chant their most splendid music. 

Huge bonfires are set going both on Christmas and 
New Year. Village folk in some parts of Russia save 
the sweepings from their cottages from Christmas to 
New Year, and burn them on New Year's Day at sun- 
rise in the garden. 

Large parties are held in the country houses during 
these gay holidays. The guests come in sledges from 
long distances — parents and children, and servants. 
The merrymakers wear old-time costumes, and eat old- 
time Christmas goodies, and play games handed down 
from their far-off ancestors. They play one game 
thus: 

A bowl containing water is set on the table, while 
the players, gathering in a circle about it, throw into 
the bowl many different tokens, such as rings, earrings, 
bracelets, and brooches. The bowl is covered with a 
cloth and its contents are stirred by the eldest nurse 
in the family, while the players sing the "song of the 
salt and the bread. " Salt, bread, and charcoal have 
meantime been placed near the table, perhaps as an 



78 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

aid to the enchantment of the bowl. The "song of 
the salt and the bread" has been translated for us 
thus: 

May the bread and the salt live a hundred years — slava! 

May our emperor live still longer — slava! 

May our emperor never grow old — slava! 

May his good courser never be tired — slava! 

May his shining garments ever be new — slava! 

May his good servants always be faithful — slava! 

(Slava means "glory.") 

Each player at length draws a token from the bowl. 
From these tokens are discovered omens of the future — 
riches, a speedy marriage, a wish fulfilled, success, 
fame and the like. 

In the villages there is still much visiting from house 
to house ; while sledges are flying through the village 
streets, masked men are cutting capers, bells are tolling 
in the church towers, and sledge bells are jingling 
everywhere. The noise and bustle of it all are dis- 
tracting. 

HOW THE PEOPLE GET ABOUT 

We might not enjoy the long journeys one must 
make by sledge or carriage in Russia to get anywhere, 
but these people do not seem to mind them at all. 
In winter when the snow is deep, with a firm top crust, 
they bundle in furs and go sixty, seventy, or a hundred 
versts* through forests, across meadows and frozen 
lakes, and over the ice of a broad river. Think of 
dashing in a sledge down a frozen river where sleighs 
are coming and going at tremendous speed, with sleigh 
bells ringing, whips snapping, and the drivers all alert 
to keep from running into the sail boats which stand 
frozen stock-still in the middle of this queer road! 

*Verst: About two-thirds of a mile. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 79 

If there is no snow, people often travel in a tarantass. 
This is a covered cart into which one mounts by steps. 
There are no springs, for in a country of wide, wide 
steppes and forests, where a break-down may occur 
forty miles from the nearest village, the fewer springs 
there are to give way the better. Instead of being on 
springs, the tarantass rests on a raft of poles — just 
rude saplings cut and trimmed with an ax and lashed 
in a row on the axles of the two pairs of wheels. The 
body of the tarantass is roomy; so hay and straw for 
a bed are piled in; a bag of clothing, some cooking 
utensils, provisions, and an ax, hammer, or whatever 
tools are likely to be needed in case of accident. If 
a pole breaks while the vehicle is jolting over the 
rough roads, the isvoschik, or driver, cuts down a pine 
sapling, smooths off the twigs, pushes it into position 
where the broken one came from, and there you are! 

And after all, a party jolting along in a tarantass 
can have a pretty good time. There are stories to 
tell — stories of evil spirits, fairies, demons, and other 
queer folk; for in spite of his religion, a Russian still 
loves to believe in the wonder-world, and the common 
people are very superstitious. Then there are the 
camp fires and out-door meals on this tarantass trip; 
and there is the fun of sleeping on the hay in the bot- 
tom of the rude coach. 

Sometimes there is a village to be seen — a pretty 
village, with a gleaming river flowing past it, and a 
white church with gilt spires, and some really pictur- 
esque houses painted pink, white, or terra cotta. 
There are men and boys fishing, and women washing 
clothes along the water's edge, while sail boats raise 



80 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

their white canvas against a background of birch trees. 
Russian landscapes are not always desolate. To the 
boy or girl used to traveling over these country roads 
there is no other land so dear as Russia. These 
children would not live elsewhere if they could. 

PILGRIMAGES 

Thousands of Russians every year go on pilgrimages 
to some religious shrine. Rich and poor, high and low 
tramp over the country, through heat or cold, clad 
in coarse garb, staff in hand, begging their bread, it 
may be, as they go, glad to suffer hardship for Christ's 
sake. Most pilgrims are very poor, but to the peasants 
a pilgrim is a holy being; and they are always 
ready to give him food, shelter, and perhaps some coins 
to carry to the shrine. 

Often we meet bands of these pilgrims. They are 
tramping to Novgorod (south of St. Petersburg), or 
to Kief (in Poland), or to Palestine, or to the mon- 
astery of Solovetsk. To visit Palestine is the chiefest 
joy of a Russian pilgrim. Next in honor is a trip to 
Solovetsk. 

Solovetsk is the largest of a group of little islands 
in the White Sea — the Frozen Sea, as sailors call this 
icy body of water. Monks dwell on all these little 
islets, which are known as the Holy Isles. The mon- 
astery itself is on Solovetsk, a famous old shrine to 
which Russian pilgrims go by thousands every summer, 
often tramping one or two thousand miles to reach the 
holy place. 

We go to Archangel and from there cross to Solovetsk 
in a boat manned by monks. What a queer voyage! 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



81 



The captain is a monk, in monk's hood and gown; the 
pilot is a monk; all the officers and crew are monks. 
The passengers are all pilgrims bound for the Holy 




THE SHRINE IN A RUSSIAN CATHEDRAL 



Isles. They are mostly solemn-faced folk, clad in 
sheepskin, rags, or some fantastic garb. Some are 
lame; some deformed; some blind; some beggars. 
Some have money and have traveled in comfort; 



82 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

others are without a penny. One man is a pilgrim 
for life, vowed to spend all his time walking from shrine 
to shrine. 

There is much praying on board, and prostrating of 
bodies, and psalm-singing. A heavy gale strikes our 
boat, and the crew sing psalms while they work. The 
crews of boats passing us kneel with uncovered heads 
to receive our blessing. 

The monastery walls rise from the holy isle and show 
their towers far out at sea. Drawing near, we behold 
rising above the walls gold crosses, churches, spires, 
and domes, like the clustered roofs of a city. There 
are buildings and buildings — cathedrals, shrines, cells, 
chapels, refectories, a prison, a palace, and all the 
workshops of the monks. 

We find the monastery crowded with pilgrims. We 
are lodged in the Guest House outside the walls, where 
the women pilgrims also must stay. Women are not 
permitted to dwell on the isle of Solovetsk. During 
the pilgrim season (from June to August) they may 
come here to pray, may eat in the refectory, and lodge 
in the Guest House, but when the summer ends the 
monastery is closed to them. They are forbidden to 
enter some of the more holy chapels, and may never 
remain within the walls after nine o'clock at night. 
The Greek Church gives its best to men. 

No monk of Solovetsk leads an idle life. All in- 
mates of the monastery must both work and pray. 
During the pilgrim season much of the time is spent 
in prayer. The pilgrim's day begins at two o'clock in 
the morning with early matins. From then on until 
noon there is one long service after another in the 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 83 

cathedrals, with prayers at the tombs of saints, and 
visits to holy spots on the island. A light dinner is 
followed by more services, until the eight o'clock supper, 
after which everybody goes to his cell, where he is 
expected to read the life of some saint until he goes 
to sleep. 

The pilgrims vie with one another in all this 
fasting, praying, bathing in holy lakes, kissing the 
stones of holy tombs, and bowing their heads upon 
church floors. 

But the monks have workshops as well as cells for 
prayer. They make things to sell — bread, clothing, 
rosaries, spoons, and what not. There is a model 
bake-house, where they make white and rye bread, 
and also consecrated loaves stamped with a cross and 
blessed by the priest. People from all parts of the 
coast come by boat to buy these loaves. 

The monks make famous kvas in their brewery, 
and they carve platters, make baskets, take photo- 
graphs, make icons, sew sealskin caps (seals frequent 
these isles), paint pictures, tan leather, knit, dry fruit, 
spin thread, build carts and sledges, quarry stone, fell 
and trim trees, even build boats. 

It is hard to tell what they do not do. In 
their little shops there is a hum of labor from dawn 
to dark. 

We find the monastery of Solovetsk a place so full 
of interest that we half wish we were monks. But we 
remember what winter must be on these far northern 
islands, and rejoice, after all, in our freedom. We 
should not like to be imprisoned by ice for eight or 
nine months every year 



84 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

MOSCOW 

Moscow, the second capital of the Russian Empire, 
lies four hundred miles southeast of St. Petersburg. 
The railway between the two capitals is almost a 
straight line. As we approach the Holy City (as the 
peasants call it) we look with surprise upon the crowd 
of many-colored domes and spires. " Mother Moscow " 
must have nothing but churches, we say. Now we 
understand why it is called the sacred city. 

But Moscow is more than a city of churches. It is 
the most gorgeously colored city of Europe, the most 
Russian city of the empire. St. Petersburg is a copy 
of other European capitals. Moscow is the quaint old 
Russian capital. It has a tragic history. It has been 
sacked by Tartars, and burned, and rebuilt, and ruled 
by some of the cruelest monarchs the world has known. 
Its kremlin (or citadel) encloses curious old towers, 
palaces, cathedrals, monasteries, and chapels which 
have passed through centuries of strange experiences. 
Many of its shops look now just as they looked cen- 
turies ago. Its old whitewashed buildings, its four 
hundred and fifty . churches with domes of red, blue, 
green and gold, its splendid palaces, its hovels, its 
rough stone pavements, make it a city to delight 
travelers from every part of the world. 

The Russians in Moscow are the real old-time Rus- 
sians. They are not like the Europeanized Russians 
of St. Petersburg. Besides, there dwell here many 
strange-looking subjects of the czar: Tartars from the 
Volga region, Tartars of the Crimea, Calmucks and 
Circassins, and silent, strange people in robes and tur- 
bans, from Asiatic provinces. Moscow lies farther 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



85 



east than Jerusalem. We call it. oriental. Oriental 
cities are sure to be a jumble of color, filth, squalor, 
splendor, and richness. 

The city lies on both sides of the river Moskva. It 
has a population of one million, and is the greatest 
manufacturing city of Russia. Railways enter here 




THE KREMLIN FROM MOSKVA REKOl BRIDGE 



from every part of the empire. Over six million 
passengers enter or leave Moscow yearly. One-sixth 
of all the goods shipped on Russian railways load or 
unload here. From a magnificent railway station in 
one part of the city the Trans-Siberian trains start on 
their long journey to Dalny and Vladivostok. Over 



86 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

the entrance to this immense white station are the 
words, in letters of light, " God Save the Czar." Truly, 
Moscow is the heart of the czar's vast empire. 

And the heart of Moscow is the kremlin. The word 
kremlin is said to mean fortress, or central official 
quarter. The high walls of the kremlin are pyramid- 
shaped and are built of pinkish colored brick. They 
enclose a triangle, one side of the wall being along the 
river bank. Great square watch towers rise here and 
there along the walls; and five gates give entrance to 
this fine old fortress. 

When Napoleon invaded Russia with an army of 
five hundred thousand men, the Russians set fire to 
Moscow as the French drew near their holy city. The 
invaders could not stay in a burning city; neither 
could they advance farther into this bleak country, 
for the winter had set in with great severity. They 
began a retreat. This retreat of the French from 
Moscow was one of the most terrible marches ever 
made by an army. Cold, famine, disease, and weari- 
ness beset the soldiers. But, worst of all, the Cossacks 
assailed them at every point along their route, killing 
thousands and capturing many prisoners. Only about 
twenty-five thousand French out of the great invading 
army left Russia. 

We are shown many memorials of Napoleon within 
the kremlin. At this gate he entered; in this square 
are the cannons captured from his army — three hun- 
dred and sixty-five cannon! Here he dwelt, here his 
horses were stabled; and here his soldiers ravaged 
church and palace. 

We ascend to the top of the Tower of Ivan, a lofty 




TOWER OF IVAN VELIKE, AND THE 
GREAT BELL 



88 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

tower which is the first prominent structure to catch 
our eyes. Its five stories are capped by a golden dome 
with a cross on top. This is a bell tower in which 
hang thirty-six bells, two being of silver, and the 
largest weighing sixty-four tons. From the summit 
of this ancient bell tower the view of Moscow is one 
of great beauty. 

At the foot of the Ivan Tower is the famous bell 
which has room within it for forty people. It is 
twenty-four feet high and weighs two hundred tons. 
It is broken, but how this happened is not certain. 
Many different tales account for the accident. The 
opening in its side is large enough for a man to walk 
through. 

The palace, "The Great Palace," of the kremlin is 
full of rich apartments. Seven hundred rooms are 
crowded with art treasures and magnificent furnishings. 
In the treasury one sees coronation robes, czar's jewels, 
crowns, scepters, and insignia, canopies of velvet and 
gold, and thrones set with thousands of precious stones. 

One enters the Cathedral of the Assumption with 
especial interest in the little whitewashed church. 
The exterior of the cathedral is shabby, but within 
the church is adorned with gold, silver, and precious 
stones worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. Here 
are tombs of priests and princes; and sacred pictures 
of greatest value. In this cathedral the czar crowns 
himself; and, having placed the crown upon his own 
brow, crowns the czarina. When Nicholas II. per- 
formed this ceremony in 1896, the coronation scene 
was said to be the most magnificent the world has 
ever beheld. Says a traveler who was present: 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



89 



" In the hol- 
iest spot of the 
Holy City, 
amid all the 
pomp of the 
living and all 
the solemnity 
of the dead, 
surrounded by 
the royalty of 
the world, 
while bells 
clash and can- 
non roar and 
multit udes 
throng with- 
out, he [the 
czar] crowns 
and conse- 
crates himself 
Emperor and Autocrat of all the Russias." The 
Cathedral of the Archangel Michael is the burial 
place of all the Russian royal family of two dynasties, 
until the time of Peter the Great. At different points 
in the Kremlin we are shown memorials of several 
famous czars. Who were the great ones among these 
rulers? Let us make a list, thus: 

Vladimir, who introduced Christianity into Russia. 

Ivan the Third, called the Great, who first took 
the title of czar. 

Ivan the Fourth, called the Terrible, a monster of 
cruelty, who was yet an able ruler. 




NEAR VIEW OF THE GREAT BELL 



90 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

Peter the Great , of whom we have heard so much 
at St. Petersburg. 

Catherine II., an empress who ruled Russia with 
wonderful ability. 

Alexander II., the emancipator of the serfs. 

There are other rulers who have done much for 
Russia, but these are the most illustrious in a long 
list of monarchs. 

We leave the kremlin by the Gate of the Redeemer. 
Over this gate is a sacred picture of the Redeemer, 
with the consecrated oil always burning beneath it. 
Overyone must bare his head when passing through 
this gate. The people of the Greek Church also cross 
themselves here. Sentries always posted at this gate 
warn travelers not to fail in this custom of uncovering 
the head. 

Just without the Redeemer Gate is an open square 
called the Red Place, where two hundred years ago 
public punishments were executed. At one end of 
the Red Place stands the Church of St. Basil. St. 
Basil was an imbecile, a poor idiot beggar who thought 
himself a prophet and miracle-worker. So the people 
honored him as a holy man, for Russians are easily 
imposed upon, and when St. Basil died, Ivan the Ter- 
rible had a church built over his grave. It was to be 
a great church; and it certainly is of great size. 

Ivan the Terrible was pleased with the building, 
so different was it from anything the world had ever 
seen in the way of churches. It is said that he sent 
for the architect and asked him if he could build another 
church like it. The architect declared he was certain 
that he could. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



91 




CATHEDRAL OF ST. BASIL, THE BEATIFIED 



Thereupon Ivan ordered that the architect's eyes 
be put out with red-hot irons, for he wished St. Basil's 
to be the only church of its kind! This story is not 
believed by everybod}^ however. 

The church has eleven domes, each of different shape 
and different color. Such a mixture of forms and a 
jumble of reds, blues, golds, greens, and yellows could 
not be found in any other sacred building. Inside 



92 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

are eleven chapels dedicated to eleven saints. In 
the Tretiakoff Gallery we see a fine collection of 
paintings by Russian artists. We visit the libraries 
and museums and enjoy a morning in the Foundlings 
Hospital. This is a important institution, supported 
by the Government, for the care of destitute babies. 
Some thirteen thousand babies are admitted here each 
year. Hundreds of nurses care for these tiny charges. 
We shop in the handsome new Gostinnoi Dvor (the 
marketplace), which is built in the same style of archi- 
tecture as the kremlin. We ride over the rough pave- 
ments to the promenades and pleasure grounds of 
Moscow, and we wander about quaint old streets 
where pedlers and foreign-looking shopkeepers, and 
quaintly dressed peasants remind us of the Midway at 
our Chicago World's Fair. 

The climate in Moscow and in other parts of Russia 
is nearly as trying in summer as it is in winter. The 
heat is almost intolerable during the short summer, 
and clouds of dust are everywhere. The people al- 
most live in the streets at this time. Men go around 
with odd little carts full of queer wooden jars, selling 
all kinds of cooling drinks. 

When we enter the restaurants we are waited 
upon by men in white shirts that look like night shirts. 
The peasants in the streets wear red shirts, and their 
trousers are tucked into high boots. They love bright 
colors, and their clothes look odd to us. They part 
their hair in the middle and have it cut straight all 
around. 

We see groups of prisoners setting out for the Siberian 
mines, exiles for life. We are glad that the czar is 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



93 



now planning to abolish the exile system. Siberia 
has so long been but a prison for Russian evil-doers 
that it is now a country where honest folk dislike to 
live— indeed, cannot live in safety. 

From Moscow distinguished travelers often make a 
trip to the country estate of Count Tolstoi, which is 
seven miles from the neighboring town of Tula. Count 




PALACE OP PETROSSKY 



Tolstoi is a Russian novelist and philosopher. He is 
considered the greatest living man of letters in the 
world to-day. His desire has been to help the Russian 
peasants. He, himself a rich man, for years lived 
the life of a peasant, dressing, eating, and working sis 
did the laborers on his estate. 
Through his efforts there have been established in 



94 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

Moscow printing houses for publishing millions of cheap 
books each year for the peasantry. The best pictures 
are printed, too, at a small cost, and are circulated 
among the poor. There is no more interesting char- 
acter in Russia than Tolstoi, the peasants' friend. 

THE VOLGA RIVER 

The Volga is the longest river in Europe. Rising 
in the Valdai Hills, it makes its way southward, past 
many an ancient town, to the Caspian Sea, into which 
it flows, by seventy different mouths, near the sea- 
port of Astrakhan. Its basin is about seven hundred 
thousand square miles in extent, for its tributaries ex- 
tend to the far limits of the empire. The Volga has 
been called the Russian Mississippi. 

The river is navigable from its source, and, with 
its tributaries and the many canals connecting with 
it, forms the great highway of Russia. A system 
of canals unites it with the Black Sea, the Baltic, 
and the " Frozen Sea." Its chief tributary on the 
west is the Oka. At the junction of the Oka with 
the Volga is the town of Nijni Novgorod, which lies 
about two hundred and fifty miles east of Moscow. 

For nearly ninety years Nijni Novgorod has held 
a great national fair every July and August. While all 
European countries once held these fairs, Russia is 
now the only country in which they are still to be 
seen. The Nijni Novgorod fair attracts a multitude 
of people from Russia, Asia, and, indeed, from our 
own continent. The town has a population of about 
95,000, but in fair time the number swells to 250,000. 

The fair is a surburban town by itself. An im- 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



95 



mense space beside the rivers is laid out in passages 
or streets along which shops, booths, and other build- 
ings are erected. Flags fly from the buildings, people 
of every nationality are among the buyers, and shop- 
men speak the tongues of many lands. Here are 
sold silks, jewels, linen, cotton, and woolen goods, 




NIJNI NOVGOROD— FROM THE RAMPARTS 



antique rugs, priceless shawls, and quaint curios. 
One may buy leather goods, metal wares, porcelain, 
teas, coffees, wines and fruits. 

There is an electric tramway, a semicircular canal, 
a circus, a theater, floating bridges, and underground 
galleries, with many a pleasure booth, whence music 
and laughter sound. We find even a temperance 



96 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

tea-shop among the many odd little restaurants. 
On the boat which takes us down the Volga are 
crowds of people who have visited the fair. Several 
Americans are among the passengers. It is hard 
to travel in any part of the world and not meet our 
countrymen. We Americans are appropriately called 
" globe trotters." 

About four miles from the left bank of the Volga, 
as we steam down stream, is the ancient city of Kazan, 
which the Russians captured from the Tartars. A 
picture of the Virgin was carried at the head of the Rus- 
sian attacking army, the very picture which we saw 
in the Cathedral of Our Lady of Kazan at St. Peters- 
burg. Kazan is a strongly fortified old city, and 
has a university famed as a seat of oriental learning. 
The largest Russian university is at Moscow. There 
are other important ones at St. Petersburg, Odessa, 
Warsaw, and Helsingfors in Finland. 

Because the Volga overflows its banks every spring, 
few towns are built directly on its shores. In the 
autumn the river is so low that steamers often 
are grounded on mud banks or sand bars. But in 
the spring a flood spreads over the low lands. 

Astrakhan is on a high island in the river, about 
thirty miles from the Caspian. The city is connected 
by bridges with both river banks. The name of this 
seaport is derived from that of an article largely ex- 
ported from here. . Astrakhan is the curly wool of young 
lambs of a variety of sheep found in Persia and Syria. 
The finest astrakhan is almost priceless. The stur- 
geon fisheries of the Volga are very important, and 
form a leading industry of the city of Astrakhan. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 97 

POLAND AND FINLAND 

Poland was once an independent and powerful 
kingdom, with its capital first at Cracow and later 
at Warsaw. But the name is all that now remains 
of this once prosperous kingdom. The country is 
but a province in the czar's empire. Russian soldiers 
hold its citadels, and the Russian language is used 
in all its schools. In the reign of Catherine II. of 
Russia, three powerful nations (Russia, Austria, and 
Prussia) took possession of Poland and divided 
it among themselves. Two other partitions took 
place in later years, until the nation was deprived 
of all power and yielded itself hopelessly to its 
captors. 

We remember one brave Pole, Kosciusko, who 
helped us in our Revolutionary War; he came to 
America and offered his services to Washington at a 
time when our little army sorely needed help. Kos- 
ciusko later led his own people in an uprising against 
the Russians and was twice victorious, but Prussia 
came to Russia's aid, and Kosciusko was defeated 
and taken prisoner. 

The Poles are patriotic to the last drop of their 
blood. They have risen against their Russian con- 
querors several times; but only to be defeated. They 
are a proud and brave people, highly educated, gifted 
in music, letters, and art; and the women are famed 
for their beauty, especially the women of Warsaw. 

Warsaw stands on the heights above the Vistula 
River, its chief objects of interest being the fortress, 
the ancient cathedral, the citadel which stands on 
a hill in the center of the city, and the many public 



98 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



palaces, fine residences, beautiful squares, avenues, 
and pleasure grounds. 

Railways connect this city with Vienna, Moscow, 
St. Petersburg, Dantzic, and Berlin. The Jews have 
made it a commercial center of importance. Among 




HARBOR OF HELSINGFORS 
(Russian Cathedral in the Distance) 



the Poles it is an important literary, musical and 
dramatic center. One sees famous actors in Warsaw 
theaters and hears the best singers and pianists at 
the concert halls. The population is over half a million. 
The national religion of Poland is the Roman Catholic. 
Finland is a prosperous, progressive little coun- 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 99 

try, where everything is up to date, spick and 
span, and substantial. The Finns are Lutherans, 
since they were ruled by the Swedes until 1809. At 
that time Russia became master of Finland, and ever 
since there have been efforts to Russianize the Finns. 
The present czar makes them learn the Russian lan- 
guage and wishes to take from them their right to 
rule themselves, for they have hitherto enjoyed "home 
rule." They kept their old laws and liberties, had 
their own parliament, and were looked upon as the 
freest people in the czar's land. 

Finland is called the "land of a thousand lakes. " 
It is a lovely country, with its islet-dotted lakes, 
its woods of fir and pines, and its picturesque towns 
and villages always swept and garnished as though 
for a festival. There are excellent roads everywhere, 
many miles of railroads, telephones all over the country, 
telegraph lines, electric lights and tramways, and 
the best of schools. 

We see the people always busy — the men at work 
on their farms, or fishing, or driving carts full of pro- 
duce to market; the women spinning, weaving and 
churning, and busy in many other ways. 

Finland is a country of fishermaids as well as fisher- 
men, and the girls often go out with their fathers and 
brothers in the stout little fishing smacks. Often 
a whole family makes its home upon the water for 
weeks or months of each year. Almost every farmer 
has his fishing-boat. 

The peasant women when at work seldom wear 
shoes or stockings, and we never see them in hats or 
bonnets. They wear aprons of white striped with red 



100 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 



and blue, and upon their heads are snowy kerchiefs. 
We visit a Finnish peasant home and find it a much 
pleasanter place than most of the poor homes seen in 

Russia proper. The 
house is built of 
wocd — low, and with 
narrow windows and 
latched ■ door. In 
one corner is an open 
fireplace in which 
burns a cheerful fire. 
Near the center of 
the room is a table 
upon which the 
housewife is placing 
the dinner. From 
poles suspended from 
the rafters hang cir- 
cular loaves of dry, 
hard black bread 
and dried fish. 

Near the fire the 
husband sits mend- 
ing a fish-net, and 
by the window a 
little girl is reading. The common people of Fin- 
land are much better educated than those of other 
parts of the czar's domains. The people value edu- 
cation highly, and there are very few among even the 
peasants who cannot read and write. 

Helsingfors, the capital of Finland, is a clean, busy, 
thriving city of over fifty thousand inhabitants. Its 




FINNISH MILKMAID 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 101 

university is the oldest in Russia. Its church of 
St. Nicholas, with a lofty dome which may be seen 
far out at sea, will hold three thousand people. 
We see the parliament house, the libraries and muse- 
ums, and learn something about Finnish art and 
literature. Finland is a land of music. The summer 
music festivals here bring thousands of people to 
enjoy the splendid choral singing. 

Finland is famous for its strawberries. At the 
market in Helsingfors we buy pretty birch-bark baskets 
of this delicious fruit, from Finnish peasant women 
who wear kerchiefs over their heads, and queer loose 
bodices, and quaint aprons. 

HOMEWARD BOUND 

And now with a last glance eastward over the Gulf 
of Finland, toward the czar's capital and the fortress 
of Kronstadt which guards his western shores, we 
sail away across the Baltic, homeward bound. The 
Russian Empire lies behind us. 

Russia is a country of contradictions . She is called the 
youngest nation of Europe, and is looked upon as really 
younger than the United States; but in 1862 at Novgo- 
rod was celebrated the one thousandth anniversary 
of the founding of the empire. Again, Russia, though a 
despotism, has for her chief friend and ally the Republic 
of France. Russia declares that all religions are 
tolerated within her borders; yet Jews, Roman Catho- 
lics, and Stindists (Baptists) are often bitterly per- 
secuted in this country. 

Russia is called the granary of Europe, and she 
has the greatest farms in the world; yet famines often 



102 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO RUSSIA 

occur there. She has the largest lakes and rivers, 
an extensive canal system, and the longest railway 
in the world; yet her vast natural resources cannot 
be developed because she lacks transportation! She 
has rich mineral deposits, boundless forests, and 
valuable fisheries, especially the seal fisheries of the 
Arctic coast; yet the Government is heavily in debt 
and much of the money needed to start manufactories 
has to come from England, Germany, or America. 

Russia has the largest oil wells of Europe. In fact, 
everything about Russia seems to be the "largest." 
Very likely she has the largest number of people who 
can neither read nor write. That is because they 
have not good free schools as we have. But Russian 
statesmen, artists, authors, and soldiers are among 
the most eminent men of the day. Our daily papers 
are full of their achievements. Many thoughtful 
persons predict that Russia will be the great nation, 
Russians the great race, of future history. 



RUSSIAN NATIONAL ANTHEM. 



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Flag of Austria-Hungary 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO 
AUSTRIA- HUNGARY 



Now that Sweden and Norway have severed the bonds 
that so long held them together, and we are constantly 
hearing that Austria and her uncongenial sister-state 
Hungary intend to follow suit, a tour through the 
Austro-Hungarian Empire, the one remaining dual 
monarchy on earth, will be particularly interesting. 

The journey will have many features which one 
through any other land would lack. First among 
these, and probably most entertaining to us, is the 
large number of nationalities it permits of our visiting, 
each of them quite separate from the rest — having dif- 
ferent manners and customs, wearing entirely other 
forms of dress, speaking in many cases different dia- 
lects or even different languages, and in various ways 
presenting to an observant traveler much that is 
intensely interesting. 

In this great empire there are Germans, Tyrolese 
(tir-o-les'), Italians and Croats (kro'ats) ; there are 
Saxons and Poles, Czechs (checks) and Albanians; 
Magyars (mag'yars), Bohemians, Moravians and Dal- 
matians ; and the people of each nationality have lived 
so completely within themselves as to be absolutely 
distinct from the rest. 

We shall be confronted at the outset by the difficulty 



4 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

of planning a route that is not a constant retracing of 
steps. If we go first, as so many people do, to Vienna, 
and from there work to the north, we shall have to 
return to the capital later and go south, and then once 
more turn back to meet our steamer. If, on the other 
hand, we go by the most direct route to Budapest 




DANUBE AT VIENNA 



(boo'da-pest), we shall be no better off, for we shall 
simply be making that city our headquarters, to which 
we return at intervals. 

Friends who have been over the ground, on being 
asked for advice, tell us to start wherever it may be 
most convenient, and bid us remember that every 
retracing of steps is so many hours' rest for the tourist. 

We who have been to Italy and to the Balkans at 
least know how we wish to make the first stage of 
this present journey; we have become so fond of the 
Mediterranean route that we resolve to follow it again. 
We sail from New York in July, for summer is the 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



season in which to visit Austria-Hungary. The sum- 
mer and autumn weather of the empire is delightful — 
much like that of our northern states, though a trifle 
cooler throughout. 

Once land is out of sight, we take to the luxury of 
steamer chairs, 
brought by the 
attentive cabin 
boys to a shel- 
tered corner on 
deck, and begin 
to read up on the 
country we are 
about to visit. 
An understand- 
ing of the rela- 
tions existing be- 
tween Austria 
and Hungary is 
necessary if we summer days on the Atlantic 

wish to enjoy and 

profit by this journey to the fullest extent. The sim- 
plest explanation of the present state of affairs in the 
Empire perhaps is this : 

Up to about the year 1866 Austria was the leader of 
what are called the Germanic States of Europe. Then 
came a sudden upheaval among the Powers, and as a 
result Germany took the lead and Austria was left to 
make her way as best she could. At the same time, 
troubles at home brought before her that which the 
Russo-Japanese War and its consequences have forced 
the Czar of Russia to realize — the fact that a people 




6 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

must be given some share in its own government if 
that government is to be a stable one. 

From time to time during past centuries there had 
come to the house of Hapsburg, the ruler of Austria, 
many vast territories, chief among them Hungary. 
Though almost as large as Austria, Hungary had been 
treated as a vassal or subject state, but she now 
demanded a hand in the administration of affairs. 
So a change was made, with the result that today the 
government of the Empire is a joint one, in which the 
two great integral units, Austria and Hungary, are 
supposed to have an equal part. This change is the 
main point embodied in the famous Ausgleich*, or 
agreement, a term with which we shall become familiar 
on our trip. 

According to this agreement, the Emperor of Aus- 
tria is likewise King of Hungary, and so soon as he 
crosses the border from one country into the other his 
title changes. He is the head, or chief executive, of 
both lands. Under him, and to assist him in govern- 
ing the Empire, there are what are known as the Com- 
mon Ministries — practically a cabinet composed of the 
heads of the Department of Foreign Affairs, the 
Department of War, and the Department of Finance, 
which last governs Bosnia, as we already know.f 

What should strengthen the union, but fail utterly 
so to do, are the Delegations. These Delegations are 
practically little legislatures, sent, one from Austria and 
one from Hungary, to meet together to deal with 
those matters that pertain to the entire realm. Each 



* Ausgleich. Pronounced, owce-glich, the ch like that in the Scotch word "loch.'» 
tSee "A Little Journey to the Balkans and European Turkey." 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 7 

Delegation consists of sixty members — forty chosen 
from the lower and twenty from the upper chamber of 
the Austrian and of the Hungarian Parliament respec- 
tively. The two bodies meet at the same time and in 
the same place — one year in the Capital of Austria and 
the next in that of Hungary, alternating ever. They 
do not sit together — often in separate buildings — but 
they take up and pass on the same matters. It is 
this parliament, then, that should constitute the true 
bond between Austria and Hungary, but such is the 
hatred of each Delegation for the other that they are 
really bodies working toward disruption. 

As we shall enter Austria first, we next inform our- 
selves briefly as to how she in particular is governed. 
We have heard so much of good old Franz Josef 
(frantz yo'sef) that we feel almost a personal interest 
in him and his affairs, and this part of the Empire is 
more truly his than is Hungary. Austria, though 
probably we have never had the fact drawn to our 
attention, may almost be called an autocracy. All 
power not distinctly meted out to some official or to 
some legislature, belongs to the Emperor. He appoints 
certain of the members of the upper house of the 
Austrian parliament or Reichsrath (richs'rat); and 
through the ministers, also appointed by him, he 
could very largely control the government. As a 
matter of fact, however, with grants of this right and 
that, he has ceded many of his powers, and that 
means virtually giving them away, and seldom, if ever, 
would he now care (or perhaps, dare) to act on any 
vital matter without the consent of the Reichsrath. 

The Reichsrath is the Congress of Austria. It con- 



8 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

sists of two chambers. In the upper, the House of 
Lords, sit " princes of the blood-royal who have reached 
their majority, the archbishops and certain bishops, 
nobles of high rank, holding hereditary seats in the 
chamber, and such life members as the Emperor 
chooses to appoint in recognition of special services to 
the State, to the Church, to science or to art." The 
lower house is formed of the representatives of the five 
classes of voters, for in Austria voters are divided into 
classes, each class casting a separate vote. 

Now let us turn to the individual government of the 
other half of the Empire. Hungary, too, has her 
parliament, consisting of two houses, or, as they are 
called in that part of the world, "tables." The rather 
sleepy upper house, that of the Magnates, is composed 
of members who hold their seats by hereditary right or 
by appointment. The lower house consists of repre- 
sentatives chosen by the people, and this Table of 
Representatives is the most fiery and tempestuous 
body in the world. 

Having arranged Austro-Hungarian affairs thus in 
our minds, we give ourselves up to enjoyment of sum- 
mer days at sea, and brief indeed seems the trip across 
the broad Atlantic. Our route lies among the Azores, 
then past the Straits of Gibraltar, on to Naples and up 
to Genoa, where we leave the boat. Having followed 
this route before, we experience only the pleasures of 
revisiting those points which on our previous journeys 
we found most attractive. We do not linger in 
Genoa, but at once board the night train for Triest 
(tre-esf), stepping upon Austrian soil within a day of 
our arrival on the Continent. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 9 

1STRIA (ISS'TRE-AH) 

With our arrival at Triest we enter the great district 
of Istria, one of the integral units of Austria and the 
upper of the two divisions bordering on the Adriatic. 
From our very first day in this city we are conscious of 
the one thing that more than any other forces itself on 
the traveler over the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and 
that is the confusion of tongues. In every city, in 
every village, the inhabitants talk in various tongues, 
those people who speak one tongue or dialect refusing 
to learn any other. 

So largely is this the case that a summer or two ago 
Austria and Hungary came very near entering upon a 
war for separation over the question of the language to 
be used in the army, the Magyars insisting that the 
commands should be given in Hungarian, while the 
Emperor-king, who is a Teuton at heart, declared that 
the army, as a whole, was his, and that in Hungary, 
as well as in Austria, the commands should be given 
in German. Even the Austrian officers were opposed 
to this decision, for, as they said, it was far easier for 
them to learn the dialects of the peasants than to beat 
into the heads of ignorant farmers' sons the German 
words of drill and discipline. 

Triest is the chief seaport of Austria, and so we 
begin our sight-seeing on the wharves, where the blue 
Adriatic rolls off toward Italy. We are fortunate 
enough to find an American fleet visiting the port, and 
we hire one of the little skiffs with which the harbor is 
filled and row out to visit the flagship. We are inter- 
ested in hearing the comments the Austrians make 



10 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

upon our fleet, showing admiration for the white ves- 
sels (for their ships, as we shall see at Pola, are painted 
a dingy green), and astonishment at the fact that 
though among the crews there are men of various 
nationalities, including Japanese, throughout the fleet 
but one language is spoken. 

Leaving the flagship, we let our boat loiter on the 
sea until sunset, that we may watch the Stars and 
Stripes come fluttering down, while the band on each 
vessel plays " America. " Never before, in all our 
lives, probably, has such a thrill of patriotism run 
through us as that which we feel here, thousands of 
miles from home, upon seeing the ' Star-Spangled 
Banner ' and hearing our own national hymn. 

Returning to the shore, we thread rapidly a market 
where familiar fruits — apricots, peaches, plums and 
grapes — are displayed on stands along the old canal, 
upon the peaceful waters of which ancient speicmens 
of sailing-ships lie at anchor. The American consulate 
faces the canal, and if we were in need of assistance or 
advice we might drop in on our representative. In- 
stead, we board the street car that runs along the quay, 
and in the long twilight of the summer evening ride out 
to the terminus of the line. 

Modern docks and warehouses stretch the length of 
the route, and we see nothing that interests us par- 
ticularly. Indeed, we are a bit disappointed in this 
largest port of Austria. It struck us as a pretty place 
as we passed through it on our way to Balkan lands, 
but on the whole, it is like a great overgrown American 
town with a foreign population. Even the strange 
costumes we expected to see are absent from its streets. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 11 

Many ladies, we notice, dress exactly alike (possibly 
they are close friends, for they cannot all be sisters), 
while the women of the lower classes attract us with 
their brilliant head-kerchiefs. 

We are not sorry to have stopped at Triest, since we 
have now seen exactly what there is here, but we are 
quite ready to start out in the morning on one of the 
side excursions we have planned. 

We rise early. At breakfast coffee is brought us, 
and a tray of "horns." We are hungry, for the salt 
sea air always whets the appetite, and so we help our- 
selves liberally to the rolls. When the time comes for 
reckoning, the waiter asks us how many we have eaten. 
Just to try him, and to see if he knows, we state one 
less than the true number. Instantly he begs our 
pardon for correcting us, but assures us that we must 
have made a mistake in our count. This is a peculiar 
custom common to all of Austria, one must pay for 
the "horns" or the pieces of bread eaten, but the 
waiter always relies, presumably, on one's honesty to 
tell just how many were taken. We may rest assured, 
however, that before the tray is brought in, its con- 
tents have been counted, to a piece. 

miramar (meer-a-mar') 

Threading the cobbled streets to the wharf, we are 
beset by women selling tuberoses. When each of us 
has provided him or herself with a boutonniere, we 
board the boat for Miramar, and there follows a delight- 
ful sail across the Bay of Triest to the palace of Maxi- 
milian of Mexico. 

We American tourists do not need to be told the 



12 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



story of poor Maximilian, the brother of the Austrian 
emperor. Never expecting to rule any land, this 
prince lived in peace and quiet on the shores of the 
Adriatic, almost within sight of Triest. Here he had 
built a beautiful little chateau, with parks set in rolling 




TERRACES AT MIRAMAR, HOME OF MAXIMILIAN OF MEXICO 



terraces, flower-beds, and hedges of the stately arbor- 
vitse; and, overhanging the coast, wide stone porticos 
shaded from the beating rays of the sun by grapevine 
trellises. 

Then, one day, there came the news of a revolution 
in Mexico, and not long afterward announcement of 
the choice by the Mexican people of Maximilian for 
their ruler. The prince had said he would never 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 13 

govern a land unless he knew that all the people of 
that land had made him their choice. So those having 
the matter in their control deceived Maximilian into 
believing that all Mexico awaited but to welcome him. 

But this was far from being the case. Of noble 
birth; the prince did not appeal to the Republicans of 
the land at all, and the Royalists soon tired of him, 
for, being a man of intelligence and liberal views, he 
refused to act as their tool. So at last friend and foe 
alike took stand against the Emperor, and revolution 
broke out anew. That revolution culminated in the 
execution of Maximilian, and Austria has never for- 
given Mexico his betrayal. 

Austria, like Germany, has its martyr-queen in the 
Empress Charlotta, the wife of Maximilian. When the 
French allies deserted the Emperor of Mexico, she went 
in person to plead with Napoleon, but he would or 
could do nothing for her. Then came the death of the 
Emperor, and the blow cost the poor Empress her 
reason. For a few years she lingered at Miramar, 
and then kind hands led her to an old, secluded cha- 
teau in Belgium, where she is now ending her days. 

Arrived at Miramar, we find ourselves but a small 
part of an army of tourists, whom the guards take in 
charge and lead over the grounds.- Entering the 
palace, we are permitted to visit the apartments of 
state, the bedrooms and sitting-rooms, and the other 
chambers leading off from the central rotunda, into 
which the road from the sea almost leads. 

In our story-books, since early childhood, we have 
read so much of princes and their palaces that we are 
much interested in the furnishings of some of these 



14 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

rooms. The library, especially, attracts us, with nine 
well-filled book-shelves encircling the room — a door in 
the center of each of the four walls alone breaking 
their symmetry — and the heavy portieres of blue at 
each of these doorways suggesting the purple of 
royalty. In the reception-room, beyond, there are 
splendid furnishings of a paler blue upholstery, great 
family paintings in heavy gilded frames, and exquisite 
chess-tables and cabinets. The bedroom of the prince, 
where he accepted the crown of Mexico, disappoints us, 
for it contains but two plain walnut bedsteads, such as 
one would expect to find in a well-to-do farmer's home 
in New England. 

From the chateau we pass out into the park, strolling 
among the terraces that make of this place a miniature 
Versailles, with the added beauty of the sea. We 
make our way down to the shore of the Adriatic, 
where a group of Irredentists are in bathing. 

During our stay in Austria we shall hear this word 
Irredentist used so much that we had best learn its 
meaning at once. Throughout these Adriatic provinces 
of Franz Josef's empire many of the people are of Latin 
descent; they speak an Italian dialect, and in their 
manners and customs are distinctly Italian. There is 
only the Adriatic separating them from Italy, and 
their most ardent wish is to join that kingdom, to 
which they belonged centuries ago,' when the Republic 
of Venice controlled almost the entire east coast of the 
Adriatic Sea. Consequently, they are striving to arouse 
an Italian feeling everywhere; they demand that 
Italian shall be taught in the university ; they wish to 
have public documents drawn up in Italian, and they 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 15 

insist that only Italian shall be spoken at public meet- 
ings. 

As we see them at Miramar, these Irredentists, or 
Irreconcilables, as their name may be interpreted — 
they being irreconcilable to Teuton rule — seem genial 
enough, shouting and joking, and splashing water on a 
group of visiting Czechs from Bohemia. Their bathing- 
suits at once attract our attention: those of the men 
are much like very loose pajamas, while the women 
also appear in trousers. Great straw hats, too, are 
worn in the water. 

As we do not care to indulge in a plunge in the sea 
today, we continue along the little path, reascending 
the bluffs to one of the cafes built over the coast at 
this point. Here we partake of an Istrian dinner — 
veal cutlet, with a lemon to squeeze over it, potatoes, 
bread, and beer — concluding the meal just in time to 
catch the noon boat to Triest. 

We do not linger long in the city, but almost imme- 
diately board another small steamer for Capodistria 
(ka'po-des'tri-a), a little town up the coast. 

THE SALT WORKS OF CAPODISTRIA 

Clumsy Istrian peasant women, barefooted and 
wearing a short skirt of black or navy blue, a waist of 
the same material, a scarf crossed over the breast, and 
a kerchief of some brilliant shade wrapped about the 
head, are our fellow-passengers. They come aboard 
bearing on their heads huge hampers filled with milk- 
pails. These baskets they deposit on the deck and 
use in lieu of seats, as the boat is rather crowded. 
From the outset these women evoke our pity, with 



16 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



their sad brown faces, their tangled hair, and the broad, 
protruding cheek-bones that bespeak the direst poverty. 
Arriving at Capodistria, the peasants shoulder their 
baskets, or else load them on waiting donkeys, and 
plod off to their distant homes. We do not follow 




SALT WIND-MILLS AT CAPODISTRIA 

them, but taking a landau, drive through the little 
town. It is a pretty place, in spite of its dusty look, 
with its two-story homes set side by side beneath the 
tall sycamores that line the streets. Out in the open 
country we go, where the salt marches — or, as we 
should call them, marshes — are located. 

Those of us who expect to see beautiful blue inlets 
of the sea are badly disappointed. To right and left 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 17 

from the road there stretch large square reservoirs, 
separated by low ridges on which a little grass is 
feebly sprouting, containing sea-water. Where, in 
an occasional basin, the water has not yet evapor- 
, ated and is therefore of considerable depth, the color is 
clear blue, but the process of evaporation leaves almost 
everywhere a crusty deposit of white or yellow salt, 
which gives the whole marsh a sort of decayed look. 
Here and there, on the ridges between the basins, 
small pyramids of salt are heaped high, and every- 
where men and women and even children are at work — 
barefooted, of course — plying what look to us like hoes, 
keeping the water in motion to hasten evaporation, or 
scraping up more salt. Low Dutch windmills, here 
and there, make the scene suggestive of the polders of 
Holland; only here, at intervals, stand Austrian sol- 
diers, guarding the salt-bed from smugglers. The salt 
industry is a government monopoly in Austria (as 
is the tobacco trade), furnishing the government 
with one of its most certain sources of income. There- 
fore it must be vigilantly protected. 

The process of making the salt is, of course, very 
simple. The water of the sea is allowed to run into 
the beds, or is forced in by windmill pumps. From 
the large main basins it filters into aqueducts, and 
from these into still other passages, until finally there 
is only the salt left behind. This is then scraped up 
by the salt workers, and carried to the bins in the 
lower floor of their homes, where it remains until the 
end of the season. Then it is all carried to the federal 
depots, in the town. 

We stop one of the children at work in the salt-beds 



18 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

and ask him how he likes his occupation. He is quite 
satisfied, for all over southern Europe children are ac- 
customed to work, and work hard, too, and they know 
nothing of any life but one of toil. The little folks as 
well as adults rise at dawn (which is usually at three 
o' clock in the morning in the summer, the busiest 
season), and labor steadily until about seven, when 
breakfast is prepared. Breakfast, like dinner and sup- 
per, throughout the year, consists of a porridge known as 
polenta, which is made of Turkish maize, rice, beans, 
white bread, and a little wine. Wine is almost as 
cheap as water, in all the countries we shall visit on 
this Little Journey, and we shall become accustomed 
to seeing the poorest peasants indulge in it. 

From breakfast until the noon meal, and then until 
supper at dusk, it is work, work, work, for all the 
people of this region. Often, when the sun dries the 
salt rapidly, they will even resume ther labors after 
supper, working until about nine o'clock, and then 
stopping only on account of the dark. We are inter- 
ested to know what a family — which usually consists 
of four grown-up members and numerous children — 
will earn by a long day's work, and we are told it is 
about a dollar and sixty cents, or just a little more 
than a single street-laborer earns a day in the United 
States. 

We wish to see how the people live in peasant Istria, 
and so we hire one of the little boys to take us to his 
home. The lower floor of the house is one big open 
chamber, heaped high with salt. Upstairs are the 
living-rooms. The furniture of the first one we enter 
consists of two heavy bedsteads at one side of the 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



19 



room, a double bed at the other, a table, and a chair. 
There are several sacred pictures on the walls, a few 
tomatoes ripening on the window-sill, and some old 
shoes in line on a rafter. This is all that our eyes can 
detect. The adjoining chamber is very similar, except 




ISTRIAN PEASANT WOMEN 



that here there are scantlings placed across the walls, 
and behind these the blue crockery of the housewife 
stands, very much as we found the dishes arranged in 
Holland. There is a little fireplace here, with a bundle 
of faggots lying beside it, and some tin cooking utensils 
hanging near, but that is all. 

Returning to Capodistria, we drop in on the Govern- 
ment Salt Inspector, and learn how much money the 



20 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

sale of salt pours into the national purse each year. 
When tired of figures and statistics, we go for a stroll 
between the tall garden walls — built of stone coated 
with a brown concrete — to a little inlet of the sea, 
listening to the Italian patois of the peasants as they 
pass us on their way home from their faggoting. 

We finally stop at the restaurant, where, strange to 
say, we find English spoken, for the proprietor was a 
bugler in the Spanish- American War, and his son is now 
the United States Consul at Fiume (fe-66'ma). Out 
in the garden, beneath an ivy arbor, "white" or 
" black" coffee, according to whether we take milk or 
omit it, is served us; and here we rest a bit, while 
watchng the men of the town at their evening game of 
quoits — a game played with a heavy metal globe in 
place of the quoit of our own country. Our boat 
leaves at half-past eight, and we have a delightful 
moonlight ride on the Adriatic back to Triest. 

TRIALS OF THE TRAVELER 

A journey through any strange land has its difficul- 
ties and annoyances. On our excursion so far we have 
found ourselves hampered by an insufficient knowledge 
of Austrian money-values, for the traveler in the em- 
pire must be familiar not only with the money-system 
recognized by the authorities, but with the old system, 
which has been abolished by the government, and to 
which the people cling with a peculiar stubbornness. 

The coins most commonly used are the tiny copper 
ten-heller (hell'er) piece; a large copper coin of twice 
the value, and the silver krone (kro'na) or crown, 
which is equal to about twenty cents of our money. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



21 



One hundred hellers make a crown. The old system 
consisted of kreuzer (kroit'ser) and gulden (gool'den) 
or florins. One hundred kreuzer equaled a gulden, and 
a gulden was equal to forty cents of our money. 
Shopkeepers usually state prices according to the 




TRANSPORTATION IN ISTRIA 

old system, but we pay for goods in the coins of the 
new, and by the time we are through calculating what 
the purchase has actually cost we feel that we never 
wish to make another ! 

Another cause for vexation is the indifference of 
hotel clerks and porters throughout this land. We 
have constant difficulty in getting correct information 
as to trains and boats which we wish to take. 



22 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

For instance, we have planned for today an excur- 
sion to the Caves of St. Canzian, the Mammoth Cave 
of the empire. We were told at the hotel last evening 
that the express for the interior would leave at 7:50 
a. m., but in reality it does not go until half -past eight 
and we have an hour to spend in the depot, glancing 
over the time-tables on the walls, for there are no free 
time-tables to be had. When a train is about to leave, 
a hand-bell is rung, and so whenever a bell rings we 
hurry to the gate to find out whether or not it is our 
train which is starting. 

At last our train does start, with us aboard. When 
the conductor takes our tickets he gives us receipts 
for them, and should we lose these receipts we might 
be forced to pay our fare over again. It was well for 
us that our friends advised us not to take much bag- 
gage ; for only after our tickets are bought can we have 
our trunks weighed and checked, and we must pay for 
every pound of baggage. Hand-baggage, however, 
we give to porters, who have the right to enter the 
trains and deposit it in the cars, insuring a seat for the 
owner at the same time. 

We have a short ride among the mountains — 
densely forested and with huge masses of conglomerate 
protruding from their slopes. The scenery of the 
region calls to mind the tremendous forestry and 
mining interests of the empire, but of these we shall 
see greater evidences later on. Here and there we 
catch a glimpse of a farm enclosed by rock walls that 
remind us of New Engliand. 

At Herperje (hair-pell'ya) we change to another 
train. As we speed along, we notice women standing 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 23 

at the crossings, waving a flag to warn people off the 
tracks, for the automatic gate at railway crossings is 
unknown in this part of the world. While we are 
waiting at a wayside stop, a great train of oil-cars 
from Baku (bah-koo), Russia, rumbles by, and it gives 
us real pleasure merely to gaze upon cars that have 
come such a distance. 

We are entering the dreary Bukovicza now, one of 
the saddest regions of lower Europe. We cross gently 
rolling plains covered with rocks deposited here, in 
ages past, by glaciers that have long since disappeared. 
Scrub oak abounds on some of these plains, and the 
lenum and the wild parsnip grow beside the twisting 
boulder fences. Here and there, on distant hillsides, 
patches of oats, potatoes, or cabbage, and orchards and 
pastures show the hand of the husbandman. 

LIFE IN CARNIOLA 

At Divaca (de-vatch/ah), a pretty little village, we 
leave the cars. At once we are among Slavs, a race 
utterly different from the Latins we met at Triest, for 
the people of this section are Slovanians, and the life 
we see here is that of the agrarian province Carniola, 
just to the east. 

Slovanians, Slavonians, and Slovaks — it will be dif- 
ficult for us, at first, to distinguish between them ; but 
each division is radically different from the others. 
For convenience we may classify them thus : Slovanians 
are found in little groups all over Austria; Slavonians 
are the inhabitants of the province of Slavonia ; while 
the Slovaks may be said to belong especially to Hun- 
gary. 



24 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



The Slovanians hereabouts we find greatly to re- 
semble German peasants, but their features are some- 
what coarser, and their skin is exceedingly yellow for 
a Caucasian race. Many of them speak German, and 
so we get on famously with them. 




THE TAX COLLECTOR AMONG THE SLAVONIANS OF CARNEIOLA 



Long before we left home persons knowing we were 
to visit southern Austria told us to be sure to see the 
Caves of St. Canzian, and it is for the purpose of 
visiting these famous caverns that we have come to 
Divaca. We engage a little sulky that is a cross 
between the English gig and the go-cab of the Ken- 
tucky mountains, and, making sure that our driver 
can speak a language intelligible to us, start out. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



25 



Along the road are the peasant homes — one story 
high, square, with the roof sloping upward from each 
wall to a point over the center — set in old-fashioned 
gardens bordered with sunflowers. Behind the homes 
are the fields, and everywhere are boulders — great 




HOME AND STABLE OF ISTRIAN-CARNIOLAN STYLE 



white, smooth rocks that look like tablecloths rumpled 
in the wind while drying on the grass, as we see them 
from our sulky. 

It is only in vacation time that the traveler sees 
children at work in the fields here. The Slovanian 
insists that between the ages of six and fourteen years 
the little folks shall be sent to school. After that they 
"work out." 



26 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

Agriculture among the Slovanians is carried on in a 
curious way. At home every farmer is proud to say, 
or to hope soon to be able to say, that he owns his 
land ; but these great farms here are held in a different 
manner. Vast tracts are in the possession of what is 
termed an Ober-Bauer*, or tenant farmer, who hires 
possibly as many as fifty Bauern peasants at a florin a 
day, with food, to work his farms. The Bauern, in 
turn, will hire laborers to assist them, at anywhere 
from forty to eighty kreuzer (not heller, remember) a 
day; and these laborers do the actual work of hus- 
bandry, the Bauer remaining at hand to supervise. 
The plan is rather similar to the Turkish system of 
government, as we saw it in our "Little Journey to 
the Balkans," is it not? 

After a bit we leave behind these lands of the plum 
and the grape and the apple orchards, and enter the 
Karst. That is a new word, but one with which we 
shall become well acquainted, for it is in use every- 
where in the south of Austria. It means simply the 
desert, or better, the barrens, a stretch of country 
where rocks monopolize the greater part of the surface 
of the earth and make useless any attempt at cultiva- 
tion. Here and there, in the Karst country, we can 
picture ourselves back in rugged New England, for the 
farmers have dug out great rock monoliths (blasting 
is too expensive to be employed here) and piled these 
into fences, while the soil wrested from the rock-lands 
is given over to truck-gardens for the farmers' indi- 
vidual support. 



* Ober-Bauer. Pronounced O'ber-bow'er. Bauer (Plural Bauern) means peasant, 
husbandman, small farmer. The Ober-Bauer, therefore, is the chief farmer. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 27 

This land of the Karst is remarkable for another 
natural phenomenon, and that is the terrific wind 
called here the Bora (bo'rah), which rages here in win- 
ter. The Bora will often last three days or more at a 
time, and before it nothing may hope to stand. On 
the roads in the Karst wagons will be overturned, and 
people blown about as though they were mere leaves. 
In Croatia (kro-a/shi-a), later on in our travels, we 
shall see some of the walls the railroads have been 
compelled to erect against this wind. While the Bora 
rages, the cold is intense, and the snow piles high. 
The peasant sees to it early in the autumn that he 
has sufficient charcoal and turf to last him from 
November to March, the season of these cruel storms. 

At Matvoun (mat'voon) we take leave of our driver, 
paying him the usual Trinkgeld (trink'gelt), for here, 
as almost everywhere nowadays, the custom of "tip- 
ping" is well established. In one country the fee 
given is called pourboire (poor-bwar) and in another 
Trinkgeld, but by whatever name it goes it is expected, 
and often, in European lands, even demanded. No 
matter what one's lodging at the hotel may cost, no 
matter what the hire of buggy or hack may be, no 
matter what price a bill-of-fare may state, it is cus- 
tomary to add, in paying the bill, one-fifth of the 
amount for the hotel clerk or the driver or the waiter 
to keep — supposedly that he may drink to one's health, 
but really as a bit of pocket-money. 

In quest of a guide to take us to the caves, we enter 
the inn, a pretty little tavern, the exterior painted a 
delicate pink. There are very few people to be seen 
about. Over the Slovanian lands the men and women, 



28 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

and, in vacation, the children, work in the fields from 
sunrise to sunset. Only the old people remain at 
home to guard the houses — the women to sit on the 
porches and kint, the men to gather beneath the arbor 
before the inn and see whose go-cab drives by or dis- 
cuss the crops, or, possibly, to beg a kreuzer from a 
passer-by with which to buy a glass of the host's wine. 

The guide we engage is a typical old Slovanian, but 
he speaks fair German, we find, as we follow him into 
the caves. Steps cut in the rock lead to the base of 
deep canons, the sides of which rise sheer to dizzy 
heights, and are pierced here and there by cataracts 
that tumble upon moss-grown boulders far below. 
Rustic bridges span the gulfs between these precipices, 
and friendly rails assist us in scaling the rocky walls. 
Through caves just wide enough to allow a man to 
pass with ease one ascends and descends these rocks, 
emerging now to look up at the face of some gigantic 
cliff, and again to peer over a precipice as steep. 

In one of the largest of these many caves — a grotto 
in which there still remains a pyramid of earth thrown 
up in Roman times — a Christmas tree, set up for the 
school-children of St. Canzian, is preserved, just as at 
Mammoth Cave a cedar, brought down by the owners 
of the cave for school-children of the locality, remains. 
And here, as there, the tree serves as a natural recep- 
tacle for the visiting-cards. 

Just as, in Mammoth Cave, there are evidences of 
excavations made in search of Indian relics, once the 
single Indian memento had been found, so here, at 
intervals, are mounds showing where the searcher 
after Roman remains has been at work. By the light 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 29 

of a torch made of fibers, and an additional magnesium 
wire, the several curious forms of the cave are illum- 
ined, the stone likeness of a horse among the most 
wonderful of the number. 

We are growing rather tired by this time. The 
climbs are steep and in places dangerous, the walking 
is difficult, and there is a certain strain in having to 
pick each step that is telling on us. Throughout the 
trip the old guide has kept muttering, over and over 
again, "Das ist alles Natur,"* as though to evoke our 
wonder the more, and now as we complain of weari- 
ness, he once more remarks "Das ist alles Natur." 
Not one of us will contradict him, but we wish that 
Nature had omitted just that one of all the phenomena. 

On our return to Matvoun we stop at the inn to 
drink just one more glass of the "red" wine (almost 
black) of the locality. As we sit here with the tax- 
gatherer and the ancients, we are joined by some 
"wanderers," for "wandering" is a favorite vacation 
in Europe. These wanderers are not tramps, as the 
name given them might lead one to suppose, but well- 
to-do gentlemen, who, either alone or in small com- 
panies tramp from town to town, sight-seeing, and 
with no other baggage to encumber them than a loose 
knapsack strapped to the shoulders, and a stout cane. 
When we reach Hungary, we shall resort to the same 
form of baggage conveyance. 

We dine with these wanderers, and enjoy the typical 
Slovanian meal. Chicken is the only meat, and the 
head is served with the rest of the fowl; beans, cab- 
bage, salad, and wine complete the feast. The bill- 

* Das ist alles Natur: That is all natural. Pronounced class isst iil-less nali-toor'. 



30 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

of -fare is printed in four languages — German, Slovan- 
ian, Italian, and Croat — in order that all comers may 
read. 

Dinner over, we engage a hack, and to save time, 
drive to a nearer station than Divaca to catch the 
train for Triest. We reach the city ready for a good 
Istrian supper, in which veal cutlet with lemon, the 
favorite dish of these people, is, of course, the chief 
feature. 

LOWER AUSTRIA 

We have. now exhausted all that Baedecker and the 
other guides list as worthy of inspection in the vicinity 
of Triest, and are ready to continue our journey south- 
ward. Early in the morning the porter comes to 
carry our baggage to the wharf, where lies the little 
boat that is to take us to Rovigno (ro-veen'yo). 

The trip down the coast is a delightful one. Pic- 
turesque fisher-boats, with lemon-colored sails on 
which are worked patterns in maroon, dot the sea, 
toning in well with the background of little coast 
towns — sprung up, some of them, in the days of the 
Crusades. We stop at some of these villages, with 
their house walls rising directly up from the water, 
and peasant women come aboard to sell green grapes, 
peaches, and pears, exposed on broad wicker trays. 
As these fruit-vendors spy an acquaintance among our 
fellow-passengers, they rush up and kiss the friend on 
either cheek in most approved French fashion. While 
the ticket-seller is going about, selling us our tickets, 
which we at once turn over to a second man following 
him with a small wicker basket, we drop anchor oppo- 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



31 



site a little hidden town, and much freight and a few 
passengers are lightered ashore in skiffs. 

Such of the inhabitants as we can see from the boat 
strike us at once as curious. All the women carry 
fans, and many of them wear their hair in a fashion 
like that of the 
Japanese. These 
two fads com- 
bined with the 
costumes — white 
waists with big 
blue polka-dots, 
and parasols of 
gray and white 
flowered patterns 
— might almost 
make one mis- 
take these maids 
for sweet Yum 
Yums from fair 
Japan. These 
people, however, 
are not so kindly 
as the Japanese; 
they are even less 
friendly than the Triestines, speaking only to acquaint- 
ances, and absolutely ignoring the stranger. 

Now we enter the Dalmatian Archipelago. It has 
not been long since we followed this route on our way 
to the Balkan lands, but the fact does not lessen our 
enjoyment of the wonderfully beautiful island chain 
which stretches along the coast of Austria. We 




OLIVE GROVES OF ROVIGNO 



32 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

remember that in reading up on the archipelago for 
our former trip we learned that hundreds of years ago 
the islands were covered with forests. Then came the 
Romans, and later the Viennese ship-builders, strip- 
ping the woods of their best trees, and when these were 
gone, using up the rest before they had attained their 
proper growth. Then storm and wind and wave took 
hold of the remaining undergrowth, clearing it away 
and carrying off the soil, until, in the course of the 
centuries, almost every vestige of green had dis- 
appeared. 

The skeletons of these islands are of the whitest of 
white rock, which rises from the blue sea in peaks and 
cones. As they loom up, or disappear in the distance, 
these mounds of white change to blue, and then to 
azure, fading finally to the same shade as sea and sky, 
when only the brown fisher-boats, with the sardines 
pictured on their sails, give variety to the scene. 

There are thousands of these islands, of varying 
shape and size.. On the larger ones, villages are built, 
and here some attempt at reforesting has been made. 
As we stop at their wharves, we hear the locusts sing 
in the young groves beyond the beach, while the sea 
chimes in an undertone, and there is the happy laughter 
of children, busy wading, or catching the sea-urchin 
for the passengers' admiration, and winning kreuzer by 
their feats. 

Many of the islands, however, are too small to repay 
even the sowing of grass, were soil furnished them, and 
so they lie upon the sea like sugar-lumps of snowy white, 
with the marine birds hopping about on their stones. 

All too short seems the sail among these enchanted 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 33 

isles, the nearest approach to which at home are the 
islands in Georgian Bay, but all good things must 
have an end, and so in season for dinner we drop anchor 
at the town of Rovigno. 

ROVIGNO 

Our first interest is in knowing among what sort of 
people we now are, and we find that the inhabitants of 
Rovigno are what are known as Istrian Italians, speak- 




LANDING THE SARDINE CATCH AT ROVIGNO 

ing a rough Italian dialect, and one and all Irredentists. 
There is a sprinkling of Croats in the population, and 
these speak German fluently. We hunt up one of 
them and he becomes our guide. 



34 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

We wish to see the sardineries for which this town is 
noted, and so we start out at once, threading the lanes 
between tall trees or four-story houses built of con- 
crete. In almost every one of these houses the first 
floor is a shop which is entered directly from the 
street. 

Outside one of the shops we see a notice of the draw- 
ing of lotto numbers, and the guide explains that the 
running of lotto games is a favorite means with both 
the government and private individuals for raising 
money for enterprises of every sort. Numbers are sold 
for a given lotto, and prizes are awarded to those hold- 
ing the card with the winning number. 

Another feature of the town that strikes us as pecu- 
liar is the government seal over the shops selling 
tobacco. These shops are numerous, and a query 
reveals the fact that one of the largest tobacco fac- 
tories operated by the Austrian government is located 
in Rovigno. The factory is composed of handsome 
brick buildings situated in a little park, and we visit 
them on our way to the sardineries. Tobacco-work- 
ing, however, is rather familiar to us Americans, and 
so after noting the cleanliness that is enforced every- 
where, we are quite ready to go on. 

SARDINE CATCHING 

As we proceed, our guide tells us of the sardine 
industry of Rovigno. Boats, both large and small, go 
out upon the open sea at night, casting their nets, and 
attracting the fish by means of a huge lantern, or in 
some cases an electric light. In the morning the nets 
are raised, and the catch is dumped on the deck. Any- 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 35 

where from one to ten thousand fish of every sort will 
be brought up by these nets, which are laid in a great 
circle of sea, at a distance of possibly eight hours' sail 
from the shore, and are plentifully baited with small 
sea-crab furnished by the large companies in whose 
employ the fishers ship. 

Brought to shore and sorted, the fish are ready for 
sale by about eight o'clock in the morning, and the 
sardines retail on the beach here at Rovigno at six for 
a heller, or a fifth of a cent. Bought up by the canners, 
the sardines are washed in lukewarm water, and then 
laid on bleachers inside the courtyard of the factory 
for an hour or two, that the excess moisture may dry 
off. They are then sorted according to size, and 
placed in cans holding from six to twelve sardines 
apiece. Olive oil from the local groves is heated and 
poured over them ; laurel leaves and a bit of rosemary 
are added as preservatives, and the sardines are ready 
for sealing and shipment. 

We shall pass several canning establishments in our 
walk through the town, but in these visitors are not 
welcome. We may go so far as to peep through an 
open gate into one of the drying-yards and take a snap 
with our kodak, but we must be careful lest the pro- 
prietor catch us in the act and give chase with a handy 
stick. 

PRODUCTS OF THE SOIL 

There are other relishes that we may taste in their 
native haunts at Rovigno. Beyond the town are 
great vineyards in which fine grapes are grown. Here, 
in season, the wives of the fishermen work. During 



36 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

the rest of the year these women are disposed to spend 
their time sitting idly on their doorsteps, or watching 
their husbands 7 nets drying on the quay. 

Just prior to or immediately after the grape harvest, 
women and children go out and gather hazel-nuts, for 
the hazels of Rovigno are famous. Children shake 
the bushes, gathering the nuts in broad sacks, and 
often as many as two hundred hazels will be brought 
down from a single shrub. Bought up by the whole- 
sale dealers, the nuts are dried on canvasses in the sun 
for perhaps six hours, losing so greatly in weight that 
a kilo* of undried nuts brings twenty-six kreuzer, 
whereas a kilo of the dried sells for forty-eight. 

We walk out into the open country, where the olive 
groves — each tree with a grapevine growing up its 
trunk — impress us with their mid-summer beauty and 
dense shade. The olive harvest does not come before 
November, for frost is required to ripen the fruit; so 
now we see only the tiny green olives, resembling un- 
ripe cherries, except for their oblong shape, hiding 
under the long leaves that so closely resemble those 
of the silvery willow. 

We have eaten some of the ripe olives in Rovigno. 
They are black and meaty, looking very much like 
shriveled prunes, and the taste is quite different from 
that of the green olives served at home. 

The blackberry hedges along these country roads 
seem like old friends, in spite of their purple blossoms. 
The bushes hide the vineyards from view, but through 
occasional gaps in the hedge we catch glimpses of the 



*Kilo (ke'lo), an abbreviation for kilogram, the unit of weight in these lands and 
equal to about 2\ pounds. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 37 

long rows of vines, planted as single stocks, and some- 
what resembling the current bushes of Ohio. 

As we walk back to town, we fall in with the fag- 

. goters — donkey-boys driving animals laden down with 

gleanings from the woods to be sold in Rovigno. We 

have had a hard day, and would fain ride the donkeys, 

' but there is no room on their backs. 

When we reach our little hotel beside the sea, our 
pedometers — without which we, as good travelers, 
would not think of starting on any excursion — show 
that we have tramped some thirteen miles. Supper is 
ready, and the little tables on the terrace, lighted by 
oil lamps hung from iron bars overhead, look very 
attractive. We heartily enjoy the fresh fish supper, 
and long after we have finished the meal we linger, 
listening to the murmur of the waves nearby, and to 
the songs of the fishermen's wives on the beach. 

POLA, THE NAVAL PORT OF THE EMPIRE 

Leaving Rovigno next morning, we continue on down 
the coast, taking one of the little steamers running to 
Pola, the Forbidden City of Austria. Before start- 
ing we buy from the women at the wharf a liberal 
supply of the sticky green grapes of Rovigno, which 
serve for pastime as well as refreshment during the 
trip. 

Sailing among the Brionian (bre-o'ne-an) Isles, we 
see handsome chateaux and picturesque villages scat- 
tered here and there on their shores; or, far off in the 
distance, between two isles, we catch a glimpse of the 
rolling headlands of the coast itself. At times we find 
ourselves almost in a fiord, so narrow is the channel 



38 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

between the islands, and then, again, we are out in the 
open sea, and feel genuine ocean swells. 

In the middle of the afternoon we drop anchor at 
Pola, the great naval port of the Empire. Dozens of 
the big olive-colored Austro-Hungarian warships are 
in the harbor ; and on the street along the quay we see 
sailors in uniforms of white and of every possible rank, 
all busy about something or other. 

As we walk up to the hotel from the quay we are 
reminded of Banjaluka (ban-ya-166'ka), for here we 
see the same little stands built out in the street for the 
sale of fruit, apricots, and pears, and in this case of 
sea-curios also, notably curious shells. 

From the beginning of our sight-seeing, we find our- 
selves hampered. Everywhere the "No Admittance" 
sign stares us in the face. We go down to where the 
warships tower, and we find ourselves separated from 
them by great walls and gratings, inside of which no 
one may go without a pass. Everywhere where there 
are forts or other military arrangements, in Austria, 
we shall find this to be the case. 

At the gateway of a large three-story military-looking 
building we accost the sentinel, and ask if there is no 
hope of our being admitted. He refers us to the 
admiralty office, and toward it we direct our steps. 
We are granted the coveted pass to the yards and 
ships, to have seen which will be very interesting if 
at any time in the near future Austria enters into 
long-threatened war with certain of her neighbors. 

The officer who shows us about the yards tells us 
that in Austria every man is required to serve four 
years in the army, or navy, and he has no choice as to 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 39 

which, unless he enlists before the required age of 
eighteen. Should he intend to remain in the ranks for 
life he must by the time the required years of service 
are over have attained the rank of an under-officer. 
On retiring, the soldier or sailor is granted a pension, 
the rate of which increases with every ten years he has 
served until it equals one-third of his regular pay. 

Aboard the man-of-war which we visit we are shown 
only those things it could do a spy no possible good to 
see. We find that there are two decks in place of the 
single one which our own ships have, and we are per- 
mitted to pace one of these, witnessing the turning of 
the great cannon, and peeping into the mess-room of 
the higher and the non-commissioned officers, as well 
as the cabins of the admiral. Compared with those of 
our own ships the furnishings here seem to us dingy 
and plain. 

Our attention is called especially to the apparatus 
by means of which, should occasion require, one-half 
of the ship may be blown up, without injury to the rest. 
We have pointed out to us, also, the various steering- 
rooms aboard, the demolition of any one of which 
would mean merely the using of another. After a 
glass of raspberry wine with our cicerone, we return to 
shore. ' 

All along the streets in Pola we find the tables and 
chairs of the coffee houses obstructing the passage. It 
puts us in mind of London in the days of Addison and 
Steele, for here, too, men come to read an entire after- 
noon over a single cup of coffee, or to chat with 
acquaintances and transact matters of business. Cer- 
tain cliques prefer certain cafes, and so when a man 



40 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

we wish to see is not at his store, we shall be directed 
to seek him at such and such a cafe. 

Military officers, too, frequent these cafes, and we 
are interested in seeing how they are constantly rising 
to their feet to salute a superior, or else returning the 
salute of some passing subordinate. Military law 
requires that every superior be saluted and that every 
salute be returned, so that the poor soldier-man is kept 
almost as alert in times of peace as in war time. 

A ROMAN AMPHITHEATRE 

One thing that is not forbidden us at Pola is a visit 
to the interesting Roman ruins of the neighborhood. 
Chief among these is the amphitheatre or Coliseum, 
one of the largest in the world. After seeing it 
one loses half his respect for the great Coliseum at 
Rome, because this one at Pola may be viewed to so 
much better advantage. Three stories high, except 
on one side, where the slope of a hill takes the place of 
the first story, the mighty structure towers around the 
arena — today a grassy field covered with scattered 
blocks of stone. 

Here in Austria the metric system of measurement 
is in use, and the friendly guide who meets us at the 
gate explains that the distance across this open space 
in one direction is exactly 142 meters and in the other 
170 meters. As we pause to reduce these dimensions 
to feet, our eyes wander over the vast amphitheatre. 
The stone of which it is built was originally white, but 
age and the weather have changed it to gray, with 
here and there beautiful shadings of brown, the whole 
taking on a peculiar pale blue tinge in the sunlight. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



41 



The old man who shows us about is one of the few 
people in Pola, aside from the sailors, who speak German, 
and he is very proud of his accomplishment. Despite 
the dust, the result of one of the summer droughts so 
common in this part of Europe, he insists on our tramp- 




AMPHITHEATRE AT POLA, OLD ROMAN RUIN 



ing about the great enclosed meadows to inspect the 
various ruins of the place. Fragments of the walls 
which enclosed the pits for the wild animals that 
fought in the arena are still to be seen, and the bed of 
a lake that occupied the center of the vast field. Our 
guide also shows us the spot where petrified human 
bones were unearthed in the excavations that up to 
four years ago were conducted by the city, which has 



42 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



owned the site almost since the days when the Romans 
ruled these coasts. Then, by broad steps built in the 
all-encircling wall, where the lizards creep among the 
stones, he leads us to the landing on which the two 
emperors had their seats. From here we may look 

directly across to 
the pillars that 
once supported 
the tiers of seats 
set aside for the 
nobles. 

Now the old 
man insists that 
we shall walk 
around the race- 
course encircling 
the arena, and 
here and there he 
points out the 
deep foundation 
hole of some col- 
umn or piece of statuary long since removed. After 
this, with no thought of our weariness, he urges us to 
mount to the top story of the Coliseum, whence we 
may look out, through the ragged apertures that 
original^ formed windows, to the sea, and upon the 
white dwellings of the town below us. 

Later, descending a street of these dwellings — 
elegant two or three-story stone houses, coated with 
a yellow concrete, and joined to one another by tall 
walls which hide from view the gardens — we reach 
an arsenal. The building was originally a Franciscan 




TRUE BOHEMIAN CHIMNEY SWEEPS 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 43 

convent, which fact is, to us, the most noteworthy 
thing about it, for beyond a row of cannon-balls and 
mortars on the lawn we are permitted to see little 
here. 

There are in the city two old Roman triumphal 
gates, which we find interesting. One of these now 
serves as the entrance to a summer garden, which is 
today thronged with sailors. As we are peeping in, a 
funeral procession passes along the street, and we are 
surprised at the curious hearse — a mere hack with an 
extension in the rear, on which the coffin is placed. 
The people in that street take off their hats respect- 
fully as the hearse goes by. 

We pass on in the shadows of the fig trees whose 
limbs overhang the tall garden walls; beneath the 
oleanders that fill the little second story balconies of 
the finer homes chimney sweeps are lounging, their 
donkeys loitering near. 

This avenue leads up to the Citadel, from which a 
charming view may be had, but as we have no friend 
among the officers, we may not venture there. In- 
stead, we make our way to an old Roman temple,beside 
which stands the venerable City Hall. The temple is 
a small building with a gable roof. The interior is 
dark and gloomy, quite lacking the grandeur which we 
expect in anything belonging to ancient Rome. The 
fact that one wall serves as a wall for the adjoining, 
more modern structure, however, tells eloquently how 
well those old Romans built. 

Leaving the temple, we stop at one of the numerous 
tobacco shops (kept by women in almost every case), 
to purchase postage stamps for our souvenir postals. 



44 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

For over Austria, the tobacconist is the legalized 
vender of postage stamps. The object of this arrange- 
ment is to encourage the sale of tobacco, which, as we 
know, is a government monopoly. 

The postals on sale in these shops are of infinite 
variety. Every one of the seven thousand marines 
and the less numerous soldiers in the city lives away 
from here, and in writing home the men use these 
cards, for the benefit of the postal collectors in their 
families. Care is taken, too, as to how the stamp is 
placed on card or envelope, and one may buy cards 
telling just what sentiments the different positions of 
the stamps express. 

The shops of Pola are very modern, and almost 
everything in them is intended for the use of the 
soldier. Most of the wares are exposed in cases out- 
side the shops, to right and left of the door. 

READY FOR WAR 

In the evening we take a car ride through Pola; 
but again the garden-walls, and the walls about the 
naval buildings and the walls about very nearly every- 
thing else, prevent our seeing much, so we return to 
our hotel in disgust. We question the hotel-keeper as 
to the need of all this secrecy, and he explains that 
next only to Vienna, Pola is the most strongly pro- 
tected point in the empire. 

"Here is a list of the buildings of war the city con- 
tains," he says, and we take them down as he gives 
them. The list runs much as follows: 

An infantry barracks; general officers' quarters; an 
army postoffice and telegraph station; a hydrographic 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 45 

observatory; a marine observatory; marine barracks'; 
a military prison ; a military hospital ; the lower officers' 
and naval artisans' homes; the admiralty office; artil- 
lery workshops ; one artillery depot ; a sails and tackle 
depot; smithies and foundries, and anchor, chain, and 
boat magazines. In addition there is a military casino 
for the officers, and marine primary and secondary 
schools for their children. In fact, ever since 1848, 
when the war harbor was opened here, and notably 
since 1858, when the sea arsenal was started, Pola has 
been supported by the nation's defenders. 

Before leaving the city next day, we are so fortunate 
as to meet Admiral Minutello (min-oo-tell'lo), the 
Commandant of all Pola, a genial old man, wearing a 
full beard and having a frank, kindly face. He speaks 
excellent English, and we should hardly take him to 
be the commander-in-chief of not less than twelve 
thousand men, so simple and unaffected is his 
manner. 

From Admiral Minutello's office we pass on, through 
a yard where armor plate is being tested, to the Naval 
Museum. Models are the principal exhibit here, but 
we enjoy more looking at specimens of old Venetian 
shot. This shot is almost like the South American 
bolas ; it consists of two halves of a ball, bound together 
by a chain; when hurled at an enemy the ball will open 
and the chain between the halves will entangle the 
victim. 

Having visited Miramar, we are especially inter- 
ested in the regalia of Maximilian of Mexico, which is 
on exhibition here. Then we glance over a collection 
of trophies presented to the Austrian hero Tegetthof 



46 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

(teg-get'off), the outfit of a polar expedition, and a 
stand of trophies — conical umbrellas of mandarins, 
etc. — taken during the Boxer troubles in China. 

DALMATIA 

A little before four o'clock in the afternoon a great 
liner leaves Pola for the lower Adriatic and Zara (za'ra), 
our next stopping-place, and as a regiment of soldiers 
is being marched aboard we feel anxious lest we shall 
be unable to engage staterooms. No reservations may 
be made until almost sailing-time, for the service on 
these so-called first-class steamers is the most wretched 
boat service in Europe. However, we succeed in 
securing fair accommodations, and at last are under 
way. 

Our cameras, which we have been unable to use in 
Pola, must still be kept out of sight, if we do not wish 
to be taken for spies, trying to snap a picture of forts 
so distant that they would appear mere hair-lines in a 
photograph, and so we retire to the cabin to bring our 
diaries down to date, and here we stay until the For- 
bidden City can no longer be seen. 

Going up on deck again, we find ourselves on the 
open sea. Everybody is talking politics, for that is 
the chief subject of conversation in Austria, and we 
hear more than we have ever heard before of the- 
Irredenta, and of the Serb and the Croat parties (each 
of which wishes to gather all its adherents in the 
empire either into one little kingdom or into some one 
part of the mother-country), and of the "Pan-German- 
ists," who would bring Austria over to Germany. 

Those of us who are not able to speak the language 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



47 



we hear about us, and so enter into the conversation, 
feel rather bored, and we are glad to hear the ring of 
the supper bell. At table we meet a man from Chili 
who is taking his son on a tour of Europe prior to 
leaving him at school in France, several Italians, a 




DALMATIAN PEASANTS 
The woman wearing about her neck a dowry 

German, and a Frenchman, and we do our best to con- 
verse with the company during supper, which consists 
of bouillon, veal with macaroni, chicken with tomato 
sauce, potatoes, sausage, ripe olives, and lastly, cheese, 
coffee, and apricots — a typical Dalmatian meal. 

Night comes on fairly early here, and when we go 
on deck again there is only the dim outline of the 
coast to be seen. We retire early to our berths and 



48 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

soon are sleeping peacefully, rocked in the cradle of 
the deep. 

At three o'clock in the morning the boat stops at 
Zara, the capital of the crown land of Dalmatia. It 
seems to us like the middle of the night as we sleepily 
follow a porter through the narrow little streets to our 
hotel. Here and there we pass a dark, forbidding- 
looking gray shop such as sailors always frequent in 
stories, and in which is sure to be sold the famous 
maraschino, a liquor for which Zara is noted. Later 
we try this maraschino, and find it to be an oily, 
almost colorless liquid, a sip of which tastes very good. 
Here it is served in a glass not more than an inch high, 
over the top of which a paper cap is fitted to preserve 
the wonderful aroma. 

It is well into the morning before we get to bed, and 
so we rise late, so late, in fact, that the crowds are 
surging by on their way to church, just below our 
windows. We are particularly pleased with our break- 
fast-room — a graveled court surrounded with shrub- 
bery, where clean white tablecloths await us and 
starlings hop about to amuse us between courses. 

After the meal we sally forth. Everywhere we find 
the people in national costume. The women wear 
gaudy yellow or red scarfs over the head, folded to 
form a V upon the back, and exposing just a trifle of 
the rich brown hair, parted in the middle. In contrast 
with their white waists the tanned complexions of 
these peasants show off well ; and they are very quaint 
and attractive in their heavy bodices richly embroi- 
dered with gilt and other threads, and their short dark 
or light blue skirts and navy blue aprons. A heavy 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



49 



metal girdle, composed of three or four windings of 
chain, is worn about the waist, and embroidered slip- 
pers of carpet cloth, black stockings, and earrings 
complete the costume. 

The men of Zara are conspicuous for their little flat 
red caps, with 
black embroidery 
about the rim, 
and a tiny black 
tassel. Most of 
these fellows are 
of swarthy com- 
plexion. They 
wear heavy slip- 
pers of hide, 
white woolen 
socks that ap- 
pear below very 
dark ''blue- 
jeans" trousers, 
and a loose 
white shirt, over 
which there fits a 
vest of scarlet, 
so heavily em- 
broidered in every color of the rainbow, as to put us 
in mind of Joseph's many-hued coat. Over one 
shoulder is hung (never worn) a coat of a dull yellow- 
ish brown, held on by a curious clasp. From the 
other shoulder hangs a carpet-bag, in which all pur- 
chases are carried, as well as provisions when the day 
is to be spent away from home. Most of the men — 




PEASANT GIRL OF ZARA 



50 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

Croatian Italians, speaking either Croat or Italian — also 
wear earrings. 

Here, as in France, we notice that most of the people 
walk in the streets, and also that, despite its being Sun- 
day, the little stores remain open for business for part 
of the day. Indeed, many of the peasants from the 
interior come to town on this day only, and then make 
all their weekly purchases. While the signs of the 
shops are printed in Italian and Croat, there are many 
soldiers in the city, and consequently German is 
spoken very generally by the tradespeople. 

Every now and then, as we pass along, we notice a 
flag floating from above some door — a banner on 
which on a field of red, numbers, such as 25 or 45, will 
appear. These flags are the signs of wine shops, and 
the figures indicate the price in kreuzer at which the 
wine is sold per liter within. If we peeped into one of 
these shops we should find man}^ peasants (some 
dressed for Sunday in European attire, except for the 
little red national cap), smoking their cigarettes or 
long German pipes. Their low, flat wagons, with the 
bars around the bed, and horses in the curious pro- 
truding collars, await them, just outside. 

In the shadow of the old Roman arches groups of 
young girls are gathered, each girl bearing upon her 
head a bundle or basket, for this is the usual method 
of carrying here. These girls wear pretty scarfs and 
dowry coins such as we see for sale in the nearby 
shops. The coins are the ordinary money of the 
realm, pierced so that they may be hung on chains or 
fastened to the dress, and are very popular as orna- 
ments. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 51 

Melon peddlers saunter about, disposing of their 
wares or chatting with the girls. Down where the 
walk leads between dwarfed arbor-vitae to the church 
a balloon vender has his place, and the children crowd 
around him. At perhaps four o'clock all this selling 
will cease, and the rest of the day will seem more like 
the Sabbath. 

AN ALBANIAN VILLAGE 

As we watch the gay throngs in the street a dili- 
gence rolls by, bound for Knin (k'nin), out in the 
Bukovigna (boo-ko-veen'ya), as the desert-land is 
called in this part of Austria. We had thought of 
taking the ride to Knin, but we should enjoy it only 
for the very pretty falls at its end, so we prefer to 
spend our afternoon in making an excursion to the 
Albanian village of Erizzio (er-ritz'e-o), on the out- 
skirts of Zara. 

Those of us who have made "The Little Journey to 
the Balkans" remember the Albanians we met at 
Cetinje (cha-teen'ya), in Montenegro, and of whom we 
heard so much while in Turkish lands. We recall 
being told how they are the fiercest people in the 
Sultan's realm, and how, if every one else were to desert 
Abdul Hamid, he could take refuge with his Albanians, 
in the mountain fastnesses of eastern Turkey, and defy 
all the world. In fact, so aloof are the Albanians from 
the rest of mankind that the traveler dares not pene- 
trate their native vales until he has drunk blood- 
brotherhood with some of their chieftains. This 
drinking of blood-brotherhood is a horrible custom, 
which we have described to us thus: Guest and host 



52 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

bare their arms, and each cuts himself slightly, letting 
the blood trickle into a glass. Wine is added to the 
blood, and of this mixture each man takes a sip, 
whereupon the two become blood-brothers. 

We are anxious to see what Austrian civilization has 
been able to do for the little group of these wild peo- 
ple which, away back in the days when all Europe 
was in chaos, and the tribes wandered hither and 
thither, encamped on the shores of the blue Adriatic. 

Shortly after luncheon we pass through streets 
which are quite deserted, owing to the intense heat, 
out into the country. Had we more time to spend at 
Zara, and no photographs to take, we might await the 
cool of evening for our excursion; but we must go 
now or not at all. Where oleanders overhang a garden 
wall a woman street-cleaner, for whom Sunday is as 
much a working day as Monday, has dropped her 
broom and is taking a siesta, and farther on we over- 
take a young girl sauntering towards one of the famous 
Five Wells of Zara, on the heights, for the daily water 
supply. 

Beyond the city proper we pass through the Park, 
filled with semi-tropical verdure — palms and oranges 
and lemons, and plants the names of which we do not 
know. Here shady paths wind in and out where the 
locusts thrum as they do on like by-ways on summer 
days in the park at home. 

We take a dusty country road beside the sea. 
Opposite us is the Island of Ultreo (ool-tra/o), from 
whose peaks, on a clear day, the coast of Italy is visible. 
Beggars sit beneath the trees along the road, not being 
permitted to enter the city. But for the sea and the 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 53 

beggars, and the little donkeys (worth but eight 
dollars a head in this land) which pass us on the road, 
we could easily imagine ourselves somewhere in our 
own Middle West: dry, dusty fields with thistles, 
alternating cabbage-patches and fields of corn, stretch 
off toward the town. 

Erizzio is a village of cottages — one-story buildings, 
which consisted originally of one or two rooms but 
which have been added to, room after room, until 
they extend some distance back from the road. They 
are constructed of lathing covered with light concrete 
and tasty terra-cotta roofs, from which grapevine 
trellises are built out to throw a shade before the 
door. Doors and windows are in the fronts of the 
houses only, while from the rear a low boulder wall 
that would delight the eyes of a Vermont farmer, 
stretches round to enclose a straggling garden, and a 
pair of olive or fig trees. Beneath these trees sit the 
large Albanian families, dressed in European attire or 
in the costume of the Dalmatians of Zara, but differ- 
ing from these people in their greater fairness of com- 
plexion and a kindlier spirit toward the stranger 

We are surprised at the size of households here, 
until we learn that not alone all the unmarried chil- 
dren, but the married sons with families of their own, 
live with the parents until the death of the old folks, 
when frequently one or two branches will move out, 
establishing a house for themselves. As the families 
grow, the cottages are prolonged, until some of them 
look like the long-houses of the Iroquois Indians. 
Over all the children the father is absolute ruler, for 
though^ Austrian law, of course, makes every adult his 



54 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

or her own master, no Albanian would ever think of 
disobeying the paternal decree. 

Like their brethren farther to the south, the Alban- 
ians of Erizzio seem to grow only enough vegetables 
to meet their own needs, their main occupation being 
the raising of goats and some sheep, and the cutting 
of hay. The latter they pile in probably the tallest 
haystacks to be found in the world, excepting only the 
Rumanian. 

We find an interpreter to tell one of the richest of 
these patriarchs that we have come all the way from 
America to visit his town, and he kindly allows us to 
peep into his home. The glimpse we get is interesting. 
Across one wall slats have been tacked, and behind 
these the dishes of blue crockery stand. Over the 
fireplace (and the sight reminds us at once of some of 
Longfellow's descriptions of New England in the days 
of the red men) the long muskets and the pistol are 
hung — relics of the days when the Albanian was the 
scourge of Europe. 

There are some chairs and two tables in the room, 
and on the largest table the youngest member of the 
family, a baby perhaps six months old, lies playing 
with a broken sword-hilt. Beyond is a bedroom, 
much like those of other peasant homes of Europe, the 
mulberry trees outside throwing their shadows on its 
floor. 

These Albanians, in distinction from their Moslem 
cousins, are Roman Catholics, and in the cemetery at 
one end of the village the graves are marked by bat- 
tered wooden crosses, each formed of two shingles 
nailed together. At the junction of the arms of the 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 55 

cross, a large circular g!ass case is hung, enclosing a 
wreath of beadwork, and in its center two photo- 
graphs of the deceased are exposed. This ornamental 
headstone seems odd to us, but certainly it is more 
liable than any epitaph to perpetuate the memory of 
the dead. 

Beyond the cemetery is the village threshing- 
ground, just now occupied by a herd of swine. The 
little herder has joined some men in the road in a game 
of lotto. As we learned in Rovigno, lotto is a great 
gambling game in Austria, but with these folks the man- 
ner of playing is different from ours. One man has all 
the cards before him, each of the others who are in the 
game having bet on a given number, or row of numbers. 
As the holder of the cards calls, he uses gravel from 
the roadside to mark off, and when a line is filled, a 
happy cry proclaims the victor. When crossing the 
Atlantic, we have seen this same game played by 
Italian emigrants aboard ship. 

ABOUT THE CITY 

Just after sundown we return to Zara, in season for 
the evening promenade along the quay. Hundreds 
of people have come out to enjoy the delightful Adri- 
atic breezes and the twilight chill, and the sight of the 
passing throng recalls the board walk at Atlantic City 
or Asbury Park. Happy-go-lucky, for the most part, 
these people appear, and they are proverbially lazy. 
A little pork, a little corn or cabbage, and an occasional 
ham constitute the fare of the wealthy, while the poor 
live very largely upon ordinary white bread or corn 
bread. 



56 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

We cannot leave Zara without knowing more of the 
famous maraschino than the mere taste of it, and so 
on the morrow we visit one of the largest distilleries. 
On our way to the institution we are passed by a long 
procession of the Albanians from Erizzio, marching 
two by two — first the children, then the men, then the 
women — chanting as they go, and bearing sacred 
relics and church banners. The procession is a 
religious one, on its way through the streets and to 
the church, that prayers may be offered for the cessa- 
tion of the great drought that now reigns. 

We find that the maraschino distillery greatly 
resembles a dwelling, its sunny courts filled with 
flowers. The cherries of which the drink is made, we 
are told, are not cultivated, but grow wild all along 
this section of the coast. They are gathered by the 
farmers in the month of July, when agents from the 
distillery go about, buying them for shipment to Zara. 
These cherries are not the Maraschino cherries we see 
in our lemonade at home, but a small fruit, little 
larger than one of our smallest June cherries, and 
darker in hue. Brought here, the fruit is pressed, and 
the juice prepared with other secret ingredients to 
form the beverage. The leaves, too, are collected, cut, 
and added to the juice. The whole forms a compote 
or mass with which an alcohol admixture is allowed 
to ferment for almost half a year, when the resulting 
liquor is distilled and bottled for sale. 

Over three hundred thousand bottles of the maras- 
chino are turned out by this one distillery annually, 
and some five thousand casks of it are sent from here 
to the United States alone. As we are leaving, the 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 57 

genial manager of the company makes us a present of 
several bottles of the maraschino, as well as some of 
the cherries themselves, preserved for the use to 
which we put the so-called maraschino cherry at home. 

We are to take the ten o'clock boat for Sebenico 
(sa-ba/ne-ko), the next town of any importance on the 
coast, and as no luncheon will be served on board, we 
must have something to eat before we leave. So, 
after a peep into the cathedral, with its fine choir 
stalls, we return to the hotel. 

Our luncheon is commonplace. We have veal, 
potatoes, cucumber salad and bread — a typical meal 
of the region ; but the dessert is a novel one, consisting 
of a plum or two served inside a puffy steamed noodle, 
with plenty of plum preserves to moisten the mass. 

AT SEA AGAIN 

The first part of the sail to Sebenico is rather monoto- 
nous, past low cliffs of the grayish-yellow shade of the 
Rock of Gibraltar, and occasionally islands covered 
with olive groves. We stop now and then at a small 
coast hamlet, at whose dock the boys reach down to 
haul up some sea-urchin and toss it aboard, for the 
amusement and the kreuzer of the passengers. 

After the noon hour, the scenery grows more beauti- 
ful, as the Dalmatian archipelago again takes on a 
definite shape — its snowy white deserted cones rising 
out of the sea, barren and desolate save for here a 
fringe of trees or there possibly a peasant home. Of 
every size and shape are these bits of land, and so 
beautiful that we almost envy the fisher boys whose 
happy lot it is to ply these straits the year around. 



58 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

Sebenico, which we reach at dusk, is a typical 
South-Croatian town, the center of a region famous 
for a peculiar industry. All about the hills enclosing 
Sebenico there grows a daisy, which closely resembles 
our camomile. At the blossoming season, which is 
early in May, every one goes out to gather these 
daisies, bringing them into the city and drying them 
on the flat house-tops. The dried flowers are sold to a 
large insect-powder establishment, where they are 
ground to dust, and this, of varying grades, is sold as 
one of the best insecticides in the world. Thus the 
flowers even things up with the insects that have 
robbed them of their honey. 

Sebenico has really only one other industry to inter- 
est us, and that is a macaroni factory, which we visit 
the morning after our arrival. Here we see the dough 
forced through what appears to be a log made of 
metal and filled with little tubes. From the tubes 
the newly-cut macaroni or noodle of the larger size is 
turned out upon big boards, covered with heavy 
wrapping paper, and placed on turnstiles that revolve 
so as to hasten the drying, while the smaller varieties 
are strung on canes to dry. 

Some twenty-nine varieties of these dough products 
are made here, and the picture presented by the great 
beams laden with the tubelets is rather pretty. On 
an upper floor, especially, where the longer varieties 
hang, drooping from the canes to the floor when dry, 
the yellow turns to green in the sunlight and almost 
dazzles one with its radiance. 

The citizens of Sebenico have a peculiar costume. 
The women wear a short black skirt with a band of 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 59 

red around the bottom; a white waist with long flow- 
ing sleeves, and a bodice of black on which a severely 
stiff pattern is worked in red, both in front and behind. 
A white cap tied so that the ribbons hang over the 
shoulders completes the picturesque dress. The men, 
like the women, are of splendid physique, but like 
them, again, they are inordinately dirty. Blue vest 
and trousers; white shirt and the tiny red cap — no 
larger than possibly two of our silver dollars, and 
serving as ornament alone — are all so grimy and 
spotted that if we were to see only such Croats as 
these we would certainly not wish to continue our 
journey into Croatia. 

The children of Sebenico are a happy lot, and down 
on the market — the weekly market, that is — there is 
maintained a booth where singing-tops, whistles, and 
similar wares are displayed. If we have any spare 
kreuzer left in our purses on our return to the hotel at 
noon, we may have great sport dropping these down, 
one by one, among the little ones at play in the yard- 
below our room, then quickly drawing in our heads. 
So poor are the most of these people that they cannot 
imagine any one being rich enough to be able to give 
away money, and it is quite possible the children will 
believe the coin (equal in value to two-fifths of a 
cent) to have keen dropped by some good angel from 
heaven. 

After we have taken a walk among the tall three- 
story houses, of stone very roughly cut, that crown the 
hill behind the city proper, we are ready to continue 
southward. 



60 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



A CITY BUILT IN A PALACE 

We leave Sebenico shortly before noon, bound for 
the most curious place, probably, that we shall visit 
in our entire journey. For we are going to Spalatro 




TOWN WALLS OF SPALATRO THE CITY INSIDE A PALACE 

(spa-lah'tro), the city built in a palace. All afternoon 
we shall sail once more among the snow-white Dal- 
matian Islands, noting here and there a stone wall 
that seems to enclose barren ground but in reality 
protects a young vineyard which peasant enterprise is 
bringing to grow upon the rocks. 

At sundown a wonderful sight greets our eyes. 
From the shore which we are approaching rise the 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY [61 

walls of a vast and ancient Roman palace, with little 
modern dwellings clustering about it so closely that 
new and old are inextricably commingled. This is 
Spalatro, once the home of the Emperor Diocletian, 
after he had wearied of governing the world and 
entered retirement in Dalmatia. 

From the wharf we follow the baggage bearer 
through the imperial gateway and find ourselves in- 
side the great enclosing walls, three or more stories in 
height and themselves formed of dwellings which are 
still inhabited. A town has grown up within this 
enclosure, its houses packed in almost solidly together, 
rising up severely side by side like tenements on an 
American water front. Here are no gardens and no 
side entrances. Little narrow streets that once formed 
passageways between the buildings of the palace 
thread this way and that, and these are constantly 
spanned, we find as we advance, by little bridges, which 
recall the Bridge of Sighs in Venice. In some of the 
bridges which join the old buildings people now live, 
though the government, bit by bit, is buying out all 
the palace dwellers, that the deserted imperial residence 
may be preserved for the future. Up to one hundred 
years ago no steps of any sort were taken for such 
preservation, and hence the houses, both inside and 
out, which mar the beauty of the stanch old pile. 

Our hotel is located in the heart of the palace, beset 
by a small army of waiters. One man brings the soup, 
another the meats and vegetables, another the bread, 
and still another attends only to our bill. He seem- 
ingly relies wholly on our honesty, asking us to tell 
what we have had, but should we, by any little slip of 



62 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

memory, fail to give the entire list, he would at once 
prove himself better informed than we in that par- 
ticular. 

While we are dining, the town clocks strike — ten 
minutes after the hour, according to our watches, 
which we set in Sebenico, for Spalatro's time is ten 
minutes later than that of the rest of Dalmatia. 
Four minutes afterward they strike again, like the 
clocks of old Venice, to make sure that every one has 
heard. 

We do not sit up late. We shall have a busy day 
to-morrow, as we do not wish to stay over-time in 
Spalatro, and so must rise early. 

An old Serb native, who speaks German, takes 
charge of us immediately after breakfast, and we 
follow him through the curious palace-town, which 
covers a space equal to several of our city blocks. 
First, he shows us an ancient Venetian public build- 
ing set in an open square, its windows ornamented 
with little railings of stone. In the background we 
see the still more ancient walls of one of the original 
buildings of the palace. 

We thread some exceedingly narrow lanes among 
three and four-story houses of modern date, their 
lower floors given over to shops, and one or more of 
their walls always giving evidence of having belonged to 
one of the Roman buildings. Donkeys, laden with fagots 
and other burdens, dispute the way, for the use of 
wagons is impossible here; and now and then a peas- 
ant company will stand aside to let us pass. We notice 
that very few of these palace dwellers wear a distinctive 
costume. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 63 

Near the center of the town we are shown the old 
cathedral tower, of uncertain date, but probably 
erected about 1000 A. D. It rises like some sky- 
scraper above the surrounding structures. The cathe- 
dral is now undergoing repairs that threaten to prove 
endless. 

From here through an arcade or covered passage 
of Venetian origin we make our way to the gate by 
which we entered last evening, that we may take 
another, closer view of the great outer wall of the palace, 
and of the green Italian shutters and lace curtains 
added to its windows by the present inmates. 

Once more within the enclosure, we peep into the 
modern Baptistry of Spalatro, originally the private 
chapel of Emperor Diocletian, and still containing the 
old sarcophagi and stones belonging to the Roman 
period. In the town museums, of which there are 
three, we see more of these stone relics, old pillars and 
statues, as well as cases filled with coins and pottery, 
urns of pale blue, translucent glass which hold ashes ; 
handsome cameos delicately chased, and figures in 
alabaster. In one of the museums we see men tak- 
ing impressions of the inscriptions on some of these 
relics, working a sheet of prepared paper into the 
cracks and crannies so as to reproduce even the faintest 
cutting. Later, these inscriptions will be translated 
by scholars whose life is devoted to research. 

Where an old winged lion, dating back to Venetian 
rule at Spalatro, flaunts from a corner of the walls, 
the market-place is laid, and here we see many Turks 
and Bosniacs. A few steps beyond, we are in 
modern Spalatro, outside the palace, where a little 



64 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

horse-car wanders along without a track, and gas 
lamps light the streets, and there are pretty gardens 
behind the low walls. 

In the afternoon we hire open carriages for a long 
drive into the interior of Dalmatia. It is extremely 
warm, and those of us who are not provided with the 
broad straw hats worn by the peasants, and resem- 
bling Mexican sombreros, or thin head kerchiefs, such 
as the women wear, have to ask that the carriage-top 
may be kept up. 

We follow a great barren mountain chain, at whose 
base lie vineyards edged with olive trees, traversing 
the fertile valley of the Jader (ya/der), that we may 
get an idea of its quaint hamlets. Each tiny village 
consists of perhaps a dozen odd houses, built of roughly 
cut boulders of every size and contour, cemented to- 
gether so as to form a dwelling. 

Lone pomegranate hedges, with an occasional 
stretch of blackberry vines, serve as fences here, and 
over them we have to climb to inspect those curious 
remains of Roman settlements which, as seen from 
the road, resemble nothing so much as the cellar holes 
of ruined houses. A wild flower like the dandelion, 
but having a different leaf, everlasting, and larkspur, 
and the wild fig and wild olive inhabit these ruins, 
helping to make them picturesque, while frogs and 
crickets sound their notes from the lowest depths. 

VILLAGE LIFE 

It will be some time before we become accustomed to 
the fact that here all the people live in the villages, 
going out during the day to work their fields. We 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 65 

find no farmhouses in the country between the hamlets, 
or any human habitation other than the little shacks 
of pine boughs thrown up by the farmers as a pro- 
tection from the sun at noon. In fact, aside from 
an occasional flock of sheep or goats, or a pass- 
ing donkey, bearing anywhere from one to four 
people, we often see no sign of life at all as we drive 
along. 

At Trau (trow), we cross the Jader on a long stone 
bridge, to enter a typical town of the interior, with its 
church facing the open square or plaza, and the gardens 
about the homes edged with pink and scarlet oleanders. 
Along the river we see the women of Trau sitting in 
little groups beneath the trees, spinning and gossiping. 
Old Venetian walls and towers, with the winged lion 
everywhere manifest, are all about here, and on the 
cathedral portico we see some rare old sculptures, dat- 
ing from the time when the Doges' power extended over 
all this land. 

The side streets of Trau are narrow and gloomy, 
winding in and out among the ugly boulder houses. 
Uninviting shops, fish-markets, and inns open upon 
the street, and in the last named we always find one 
wall deeply indented to make way for the tun of wine. 
Men sit here playing pinochle (at least such seems the 
game), the day through, and if the work in the fields is 
done we can scarcely blame them, for their homes are 
so dark and dingy that it is little wonder they do not 
care to go there. 

We ourselves tire very quickly of Trau, but we would 
not have missed our excursion for a good deal, since 
it has shown us exactly what village life in Dalmatia is. 



66 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

After a glance at the great silvered statue of an abbot 
in the town church, we return to our carriages for a 
circuitous drive to Salonae (Sa-lo-na'). 

WHERE THE FURIES FOUGHT 

On our way to this town the guide tells us its story. 
In the struggle between Octavius Caesar and Pompey, 
Salonae, then a flourishing city, adhered to Caesar. 
As a result, it was besieged by Pompey, and it seemed 
as though the town must yield. Finally, one night, 
while the beleaguering forces were encamped all around, 
the women of the town appeared on the walls, hair 
flying, voices uttering long, wild calls, and hands 
brandishing torches, and the superstitious legions of 
Pompey, mistaking them for the Furies come to pro- 
tect Salonae, fled in terror, pursued by the soldiers 
from inside the city. 

To-day Salonae reminds us of the excavated parts 
of Herculaneum, for it is a city of ruins. A very pretty 
stone dwelling has been erected for the custodian of 
the place, behind which, over the hillside, stretches 
the early Christian burying-ground, with its old pillars 
and tombs. The latter bear the marks of desecration 
by ravaging Goths, while the graves of the poor re- 
main almost untouched, containing too little of value 
to warrant raising the heavy stone covers. 

In the valley, among the vineyards and the meadows, 
old walls and piers and pillars rise everywhere, giving 
to the landscape an air of sadness in the sundown. 
Little folk from the vicinity come up from these fields 
of vine to sell us Roman coins or ornaments, dug up in 
plowing ; or to volunteer to guide us to a small amphi- 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 67 

theater which has been exhumed on a more distant 
hillside. 

The sun is well nigh set before we have completed 
our ramble here, and, as we return to the road, we find 
Turks and Bosniacs, Croats and Serbs, thronging the 
highway, bound, as are we, for the town. Our boat 
leaves at midnight, so we are in no haste, but enjoying 
the delightful evening breeze drive slowly back to 
our hotel in a palace. 

THE BALKANS AGAIN 

The next stage of our journey will not be new to some 
of us, who only a short time ago visited the Balkan 
lands, for we are now bound for Ragusa and Cattaro. 
Those of the party who did not take that trip are 
anxious to see something of the lower coast of Austria, 
and all of us can enjoy the sail. There is little travel 
along this route in July, so we have plenty of room on 
the steamer, and we revel in the luxury, and sleep 
soundly the night through. When we wake and go on 
deck before breakfast, we find that the boat has cast 
anchor at Gravosa, the port for the summer city of 
Ragusa. Ragusa is the most beautiful spot, barring 
none, in the Balkans, and our hearts thrill with pleas- 
ure as we once more gaze upon the lofty mountains, 
forest clad, and reaching almost to the clouds, in 
majestic splendor all about us. 

Landing, we take a wagonette for one of the summer 
hotels on the heights. This time we shall stop at the 
largest of these, because it has the deserved reputation 
of being one of the finest in all Europe. Four great 
verandahed stories rise up among the shrubbery in 



68 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

Venetian lines and curves, upon a terrace where olean- 
ders of five several hues are planted in great hedges. 
From the house avenues bordered with the century 
plant and palms of every sort lead away through the 
trees. From our rooms we have a view of the bay at 
the foot of the forest palisades. 

After washing up a bit, we stroll down again to the 
older town of Gravosa, at the foot of the mountains. 
Originally the two places were quite distinct, but now 
the name of either is used for the other, and the steam- 
ers call the stop Ragusa, because of the hotels at that 
place. We fall in with a farmer's boy who speaks a 
little German, and from him we learn one of the 
pretty stories of the Adratic, which reminds us of 
one we have often read in connection with Scotch 
history. 

Many, many years ago a poor sailor left Gravosa to 
sail the seas. He had put all his little savings in a 
vessel, that he might hold the honored title of skipper, 
and he hoped much from the voyage. But Neptune 
was unkind, and the ship went down. The sailor 
escaped with his life, and returned to his home. His 
ill-luck made him first curse his fate and then vow to 
prosper in spite of it, and so he borrowed from friends 
and relatives, borrowed all that they could spare — 
which is so little in these countries — and fitted out 
another boat. Again he put to sea, and again the 
ship was wrecked, and the skipper himself barely 
escaped drowning. 

Wrecked financially, the man took one of the small- 
est rooms in the upper floor of a tenement of Gravosa, 
and there sat down to bemoan his fate. As he sat 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 69 

looking out on the cruel sea, which smiled so peace- 
fully here, he caught sight of a spider in the corner of 
the window, trying, as spiders will, to throw her cables 
and secure her web. Once the little insect made the 
swing and failed. Again she tried, and again she failed. 
Then she rested a moment before nerving herself for 
a third attempt. This time a favoring breeze caught 
the silky strand, and the cable was fast. 

To the sailor, superstitious as all sailors are, the 
little incident seemed as a message from heaven. 
Going before the town council, he told his story, inspir- 
ing his hearers with its divine suggestion, and vowing 
that if the council would assist in fitting him out once 
more, and he should succeed, he would richly repay the 
city. The money was lent, the man put to sea, and 
came home richer than his fondest dreams had ever 
anticipated. Faithful to his promise, he bequeathed 
to the city a sum whereby every poor girl of the place 
is given a dowry sufficient to allow her to wed the 
man of her choice; for, in this part of the world, 
people must have a certain amount of wealth, 
according to their station in life, before they may 
marry. 

Natives in blue bloomers with broad red belts, lav- 
ender skirts and scarlet fez; Turks with a towel of 
white wrapped around the head as a turban, and 
Albanians in white flannel suits with tight fitting 
trousers, will attract our eyes at once as we pass through 
a gateway in the thick old walls and take the path 
beside the sea, with the Island of Lacroma (La-kro'ma), 
a tropic park belonging to Ragusa, just opposite. 



70 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

THE LESSON AN EARTHQUAKE TAUGHT 

There is a curious feature of Ragusa, that strikes us 
during this visit. Each house stands isolated from its 
neighbors — a precaution learned from an earthquake 
that wrought much damage here early in the nineteenth 
century. The homes almost invariably have a store 
on the lower floor, with a single narrow window at 
one side of an equally narrow door. Clothing and fire- 
arms are the chief wares displayed in these shops. 

The sights of the town are soon seen — an old Fran- 
ciscan church, the statue of a soldier surmounting a 
tall pillar, a tall old clock tower, with a curious, carved 
entry, facing the custom house, and the cathedral. In 
the shadow of the buildings about the plaza, the Al- 
banian melon sellers squat awaiting the chance pur- 
chaser. 

A QUEER RECEPTION 

Returning to the hotel for a meal on the veranda, in 
the shade of the great old trees, where locusts thrum 
and the sea wind sings, we prepare for a trip out into 
the heart of the country, the Canali-tahl (Ka-nah 7 - 
le-taM'). We remember vividly our former excursion 
into this region, and are interested in seeing how the 
uninitiated of our party enjoy the trip. 

We have a long drive, skirting the Adriatic to the 
foot of the mountains. Here the horses are hitched, 
while we go afoot up a narrow little trail to a peasant 
home. Only the women are in, so we await the return 
of the men for our real reception. This opens by the 
oldest man of the family taking from a closet a decanter 
probably a foot in height, filled with gin. He pours 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 71 

out a little maraschino glassful of it, and, wishing us 
good luck, swallows the liquor. Refilling the glass, 
without washing or wiping it, each member of the 
family drinks to us, and, last, we must return the com- 
pliment by taking a glass of the liquor. 

After that the women in their clean white head- 
dresses and embroidered white waists, and skirts of a 
darker material, pass about a wine cake. This cake 
resembles the pumpernickle of Germany, externally, 
but is composed of pressed figs and other fruit. After 
this drinking water is served, and the host offers the 
men of our party tobacco from his little box. While 
the men smoke in silence, the voices of the sheep, 
occupying the lower floor of the dwelling, are heard 
below. 

After the smoke we are taken about the house to 
see the bedrooms, each with a double bed, and sus- 
pended from the ceiling a pole on which to hang clothes. 
A few sacred pictures adorn the walls. 

We return to the stone porch, overlooking a barren 
little garden enclosed by walls and shaded by mulberry 
and fig trees, where the supper is served, our hosts 
refusing to eat with us, that they may have the honor 
of serving the meal. Dishes, ornamented with a flower 
pattern, silver knives and forks, and napkins are in 
use. The feast consists of a great eighth-loaf of freshly 
baked bread, tasting like Boston brown bread, dried 
ham cut so thin as to be almost translucent, and a 
decanter of home-made red wine. 

While we sup we catch glimpses of the children 
peering around the corners at the rare Americans, but 
the little ones flee before our most gentle advances. 



72 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

After this course a light orange sherry, sweet and 
strong, is served in water goblets and followed by a 
dish of soft boiled eggs. 

On leaving we shake hands all around, while our 
guide, who is the landlord of the adjoining farms, 
gives to our host's eldest son a kiss/ since he is this 
boy's brother, his father having been the young peas- 
ant's sponsor at baptism. The drive back to Ragusa 
in the moonlight is delightful, and we regret that we 
have not longer to spend among the summer hotels on 
the bluffs, but the next morning a steamer leaves for 
the south, and we must go on. 

This lower Dalmatian coast is remarkable for its 
innumerable bights, or little bays, formed by curves 
and bends in the coast. They certainly deserve their 
name, for they give one the impression that some giant 
has bitten large mouthfuls from the shore. A road 
follows the coast along here at the base of curious 
yellow-white hills of rock, covered with a scrub vege- 
tation, which reminds us of that of the Axenstrasse 
(ahk'sen-strahs'sa), of Switzerland. 

CATTARO 

We dine aboard the boat, and as we leave the table 
after the meal we find ourselves entering the famous 
Bocches Cattaro, conceded by many to be the most 
magnificent series of fiords, or inlets of sea, in the world. 
The fact that we have sailed through them before does 
not lessen our enjoyment of the wonderful scenery. 

Entering the first of these basins, we find ourselves 
in an almost circular lake of sea, surrounded by stu- 
pendous mountains, some of them forested, others not, 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 73 

but faced with rock alone, and rising steep and sheer 
to higher chains ahead, which threaten, apparently, 
to hem us in. Here and there a hamlet may be seen 
upon the mountain side, often so near the summit as 
to cause us to wonder how the inhabitants make the 
long climb from the sea. 

At one o'clock we stop at Castelnuovo (kas-tell-noo- 
oh'vo), at the foot of a great mountain rock, with an 
ancient castle high above, commanding the last great 
highway in the south of Austria, and also a road that 
leads easterly across to the Herzegovina, branching off 
at one side. We are told that at Christmas time, in 
the little villages along this road, the families strew a 
log with grain and oil and wine, and the head of the 
family asks God to be equally bountiful to his little 
ones next year. Then there are songs and a feast on 
Christmas eve, ending in the firing of the guns of all 
the men of the family out under the stars. 

Firearms play an important part in the festivities 
of this region. On the occasion of a wedding, the men 
of the bridegroom's clan go armed to the home of the 
bride, demanding her from her parents, and giving a 
hearty handshake in token of their good intentions. 
When she is given over to them, all muskets are emptied 
in her honor. At baptisms, too, shooting is the proper 
form of congratulation. 

Leaving Castelnuovo and rounding the base of the 
mountains, the ship enters an unsuspected little strait, 
which reminds us of the Narrows of Lake Chautauqua, 
and comes out in the next bocche, this one distinguished 
from the rest as the harbor of a good sized fleet of 
Austro-Hungarian warships. At the foot of the 



74 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

mighty mountains surrounding the basin, the eight 
dull colored vessels ride at anchor, and as we sail by 
so quietly into the third bocche, we dip our flag in 
salute. On and on the boat glides, stopping only at 
the little wharfs of small, half forsaken towns, almost 
deserted since the great emigration to California. 
Late in the afternoon we reach Cattaro, the southern- 
most point in Austria, and here we go ashore. 

Cattaro' s only interest is its position at the very end 
of a mighty empire, and the fact that Germany cher- 
ishes the hope some day to extend as far as this. We 
who have passed through the town on our way to Mon- 
tenegro, remember it only as a gateway to the Balkan 
lands. Its plain, ugly stone houses face on narrow, 
paved streets. There are no gardens, save an occa- 
sional raised terrace, graced by a fig or pomegranate 
bush in a flower pot, and a little park, the lower end of 
which serves as a market place. The signs of shops 
are in Cyrillic, as well as German, for Montenegrins 
are numerous here, and we hear both the Serb and the 
Croat spoken by many people. 

After peeping into a little Greek church, which is 
worth visiting for its pretty altar screen, and looking 
at the various Roman arches and bits of wall dating 
back to the days of the Caesars, we have practically 
seen the city. In order to be able to say we have stood 
at Ultima Thule, we walk to the town wall and out 
over a bridge where sentries stand guard, and here our 
journey must end. 

Beyond, the serpentine road criss-crosses up the 
mountain side into Montenegro, and some of us recall 
a delightful drive we had over that thoroughfare. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 75 

We sleep late next morning. Having accomplished 
a good bit of globe-trotting in the past few days, we 
are pleased to find now that we may indulge in solid 
rest, and this without the waste of a moment's time. 
We have the morning in Cattaro, to idle in the park — 
where the ladies smoke their cigarettes while doing the 
family knitting — and to saunter through the market. 
Then, after luncheon, we go aboard the through boat, 
and stowing away our possessions in our cabins, settle 
ourselves on deck, prepared to enjoy a long, delightful 
sea voyage. 

At half past two we weigh anchor, bound northward. 
This time our way lies farther from the coast. We 
pass new, larger islands, and often are out of sight of 
land altogether. We are now enroute for Fiume. 

All the afternoon, all night, we sail, ploughing our way 
quietly northward up the Adriatic, and at a quarter 
before ten next morning are off Zara. On and on we 
go, until almost opposite Pola, when we bend into the 
Gulf of Fiume and drop anchor before Fiume, the great 
seaport of the kingdom of Hungary. 

Close to the harbor is the American consulate, and 
Uncle Sam, with his flag floating in the breeze, is the 
first to welcome us, just as he was the last to wave us 
a good-bye when, homeward-bound from the Balkans, 
we sailed from this port for Italy. 

A ROYAL FREE CITY 

Arriving at Fiume, we enter one of the most curi- 
ously governed cities in the world. Hungary owns 
the crown land of Croatia, in which Fiume is located, 
and the city, instead of being subject to the law of 



76 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



Croatia, is responsible only to the central government. 
It is as though Chicago, lying in the state of Illinois, 
were not subject to the laws of Illinois in any way, but 
simply obeyed those of the United States as a whole. 
The reason for this is that Fiume is what is known as 
a " royal free city." 

Possibly in our " Little Journey to Germany" we 
learned something of the old free cities of that country. 
In ancient times a city was usually governed by some 
powerful noble, who had his castle on the hill or Burg 
(boorg) above the town, and who forced the people to 
pay for every privilege he granted them. In times of 
war, however, when the noble needed money, he was 
only too glad to sell to the city certain privileges for 




FIUME, THE GREAT HUNGARIAN SEA-PORT 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 77 

the gold with which wealthy merchants could provide 
him. 

That was one way of achieving independence. 
Another was this: When the noble and the king fell 
out and the city sided with the monarch, the latter, 
when he had crushed his rebellious subject, would 
reward the faithful townspeople by giving the place 
liberties not possessed before. Thus came about the 
royal free cities, and such a one is Fiume. 

Fiume city interests us for another fact: In the 
past few years Bridget and Paddy have to some 
extent been supplanted in our kitchens and stables 
by Hungarian immigrants, and almost all of these 
have come to us by way of Fiume. The Hungarian 
government encourages the poor and needy to emi- 
grate to America, and they are sent over on vessels 
constructed purposely for emigrant passage and oper- 
ating between Fiume and New York. We visit one 
of these ships while at Fiume, and are amazed at the 
immensity of the one long deck on which the third- 
class passengers sit during the voyage. On the wharf 
we see some of our prospective countrymen — bare- 
footed, hatless, and many of them wearing only a 
gingham slip, or a shirt and pair of trousers. 

Returning to the land, we walk along the quays of 
Fiume, where the great warehouses are located. 
These big buildings remind us somewhat of those we 
saw at Salonica. Suddenly we hear the ringing of a 
bell near us, and a traveling butcher shop, such as we 
used to have in the country at home, goes by. There 
is another jingle, a street car stops beside us, and we 
board it for a ride. Besides going through town, we 



78 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



are going out of the country, for before we have ridden 
many blocks we learn that we are again in Austria. 
We go on and are in Hungary once more. So close 
is the border to the heart of town here. 

On the latter part of this ride we pass a great yard, 




SLOVAK EMIGRANTS ON SHIP AT FIUME 
About to leave for New York 



surrounded by high brick walls. In the buildings 
within, we learn, the famous Whitehead submarine 
torpedoes are manufactured, to be sent to all parts of 
the world. Here were made the deadly missiles that 
created such havoc in the Russo-Japanese war. There 
are so many secrets about torpedo-making that 
visitors are unwelcome to the factory, and even our 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 79 

consul here at Fiume cannot manage to have us 
admitted for a trip of inspection. 

Past an immense rice and starch factory and a 
petroleum harbor, where Russian oils are handled, we 
go, and return at length to the center of town, repassing 
the Public Gardens, and the Imperial Naval Academy 
and Theater. Leaving the car, we step into a cafe, 
as does every one in Fiume, either for a cup of coffee 
or a dish of the ice-cream, served with a wafer, which 
is so popular here. While we are eating our ice-cream 
children go by, peddling fresh fruit dipped in a glass 
of melted sugar just thick enough to coat the plum or 
grape, and, as in France, we feast on these dainties. 

In Fiume a little knowledge of Italian stands one in 
good stead. The town is full of Irredentists, and 
while there are many signs printed in German and in 
Magyar, they are not nearly so numerous as the 
Italian. 

Our second day in the city we walk down the broad 
asphalt streets to do some shopping, for the stores 
here are as attractive as any in Europe. They have 
exceedingly broad and large show windows, opening 
like doors streetward, and usually two or three times 
as large as our own. 

In many of these windows are exposed, on a series 
of shelves, novelties made of a shell found on some 
near-by islands which resembles mother-of-pearl so 
closely as to deceive all but the expert. Most of 
these trifles are miniature reproductions of well- 
known articles — tiny aquariums to be worn on the 
watch-chain, diminutive pencils and pens and forks, 
knives and spoons, little boxes of dominoes, the whole 



80 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

case not an inch in length— and a thousand and one 
other things. 

Following the street to the outskirts of town, we 
come to the second-hand bazaars, and then to the 
town walls, where persons entering the city are searched 
for dutiable articles, for Fiume has a right to exact a 
customs duty just as a country has. 

We take a hill road from here, and follow it to the 
foot of the famous pilgrimage stairs — a broad flight of 
stone steps leading among the homes and fields, up a 
very steep hill, to the large Roman Catholic church 
overlooking the city. All along the stairway are built 
little shrines, where sacred relics are shown beneath 
panes of glass, and in the shadow of the shrines women 
sit, peddling rosaries, scapulars, and tapers to be 
burned at the shrine. 

The church of Saint Vest, at the top of the hill, to 
which the pilgrims go to offer their prayers, we find 
intensely interesting. Its walls are hung with pic- 
tures of storm-tossed vessels, and in one corner of each 
picture is a portrait of the Saint, whose prayers have 
saved the vessel from destruction. Pilgrims go bare- 
footed from picture to picture, kissing each, or they 
encircle a certain pillar of the church a given number 
of times before kissing the relics which are hung in 
cases on this column. 

We are very tired after our climb, and the descent 
of the stairs is made slowly — the more so because of 
the charming view of town and sea which it affords. 
On our way back to the city we pass a house in course 
of erection, and are surprised to see at work women as 
hod-carriers. In fact, the activity of everybody 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



81 




WOMEN HOD-CARRIERS AT FIUME, CROATIA 



in Fiume is a shock to us, coming from the easy- 
going southern provinces. 

During the noon hours, however — from twelve to 
two — the stores are closed here, and so we drop into 
another cafe for a long summer's dinner, from which 
we rise to catch the tug to Abbazia (ab-bat'ze-a), 
Hungary's summer-resort by the sea. Abbazia is 
semi-tropical in its foliage, and with its hotels, its 
villages, its band-stands and its booths, recalls some of 
our own southern winter resorts. Here, however, the 
villas all belong to royalty, the Prince of This, the 
King of That, and the Duke of Something Else. We 
could not have found a more delightful spot in which 
to spend the warm summer's evening than this, where 



82 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

the music of the gypsy orchestras chimes in with that 
of the waves, and the pretty lanes among the orange 
and lemon trees invite one to wander on, to baths and 
bazaars and belvideres beside the sea. 

There is another summer resort in Hungary which 
we wish to see in order to watch the Magyar at play, 
and that is in the Plitvica (plit-vit'ka) Lake country. 
Accordingly we leave Fiume in the morning for Ogulin 
(o'goo-lin), a typical hamlet of interior Croatia, which 
is the railway station from which the lakes may be 
most conveniently reached. 

A CROAT VILLAGE 

Ogulin reminds us somewhat of a Dutch village, the 
roofs of the little plaster-coated houses having the 
peculiar slant we notice in roofs in Holland, and their 
thatch, also, being covered over with moss. There 
are double sets of windows here for protection against 
the cruel Bora, or winter wind, of which we hear so 
many almost incredible tales in this region, and between 
the two sets of panes lace curtains swing idly now. 
Most of the houses consist of but two rooms, and one 
of these cottages is a little country store, with a sign in 
Croatian over the doorway. Now and then a bar 
occupies the front chamber of a house, and the fact is 
made known by a big wooden pitcher hanging from a 
crane above the door. 

From one side of every house there stretches a low 
garden wall — so low that we can look over it into the 
garden behind. Plum trees, whose laden boughs 
remind us of the groves on the Lake Erie islands, 
shade these walls, dropping the plums into a neat 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



83 



vegetable garden containing carrots and cabbage and 
onions, each row of the plants edged off with the old- 
fashioned phlox, lady-slippers, oleanders, and sun- 
flowers. Every garden, moreover, has a little latticed 
summer-house, where, at about four in the afternoon, 
the family gathers — the women to sew, or to do some 
darning; the men with their long German pipes to 
indulge in a recess smoke; and all to make merry over 
the afternoon coffee. 

The dress of these Croatians we do not find particu- 
larly attractive. The men wear a long white jacket 
which hangs below the belt, and over which a short 
vest of darker color fits; white trousers and a soft 
black hat complete the costume. The women have 




LITTLE CROATIANS TAKING THE WEEKLY BATH 



84 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

still less in the way of a distinctive dress, wearing 
common blue ginghams. The only noticeable thing 
about their costume is a handkerchief of navy or even 
darker blue, upon which a pad is fastened, so that they 
may carry on their heads their great hampers of wash 
to and fro between their homes and the river. 

We follow one of these women to the public laundry, 
situated in a ravine behind the town, and we come on 
a merry scene. Ail the little folks of Ogulin are here, 
either helping their mothers tread the wash on the 
rocks, or indulging in a bath, or else romping about 
clad only in Nature's own garments, as children will, 
the world around, at the old swimming-hole. 

We have been planning to drive from Ogulin into 
the lake country, and as the only drivers to be had are 
the farmers of the place, we must wait till the men 
come in from the fields. Their coming, at sunset, 
brings us disappointment, for seeing at once that we 
are Americans, they demand a double fare, and rather 
than be cheated so outrageously we give up the trip 
entirely. We are influenced in our decision by the 
appearance and manner of the men; they are a rough 
lot, and their reputation is not of the best. 

So we spend the night, or part of it, at the inn of 
Ogulin, lulled to sleep by the perfect quiet of the 
country town. 

THE CAPITAL OF CROATIA 

At three in the morning we rise to catch the train for 
Agram (ah'gram), the capital of Croatia. We wish to 
spend a Sunday morning there in order to see the 
weekly market, which we missed when we passed 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 85 

through the city on our way from Montenegro to Bosnia. 
The Agram market is considered the most beautiful in 
the world. Every village in Croatia sends peasants 
here to sell fruits and vegetables, and all the people, 
both men and women, are in white. Upon this white, 
designs in red or blue are embroidered, in some cases 
very heavily, in others only as a border or to set off 
the white, but in every case so as to leave the shade 
of the snow-flake predominant. The sight of these 
hundreds on hundreds of people in white, with just 
enough variety in the ornamentation to prevent 
monotony, is one we shall never forget. We spend the 
entire morning among the peasants, beginning the 
regular sight-seeing only at noon, when they depart 
for their homes. 

A tall church, with a curiously painted rococo roof, 
at once attracts us, though the interior we find to be 
very plain. In the shadow of the church is the palace 
of the Bonus (bah'nuss) or Governor of Croatia. The 
palace is an unpretentious, two-story building, the 
roof sloping streetward, and the coat of white paint 
which covers the whole making it resemble some of the 
taverns in Continental times in our own country. 
Over the way from this palace is the home of the 
Croatian Landtag (landt'tag) or Parliament. This 
assembly, a stormy body, is now having trouble with 
Hungary, who, it claims, does not give the Croatians a 
proper government. 

We pass another church with exquisite windows of 
stained glass, descend a lane, and crossing the old 
threshhold of the city, a gate of ancient bricks and 
mortar, pass out into beautiful modern Agram, a 



86 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

city of wide asphalt streets, shaded but slightly by the 
young trees planted at their sides ; of handsome public 
and business structures; of boulevards and parks and 
plazas that in many ways remind us of the modern 
sections of Boston. 

Almost all the business houses are three or four 
stories high, wide, and built in nearly every case of 
stone, so as to present one impressive facade. Beyond 
the stores are the residences, likewise in rows, almost 
all have gardens in the rear, and most of the buildings 
are rented out in suites of rooms, much like our flats. 

The school buildings of Agram, which cluster closely 
together, are the finest we have seen anywhere in our 
travels. There are the high school, the weaving- 
school, the university, and the ordinary schools — all 
lodged in buildings so fine that the famous Bourse at 
Paris does not excel them so far as external appear- 
ances go. 

Close at hand is the Art Muesum, where we see 
some of the fine paintings by Masic (ma/she-sha), one 
of Croatia's greatest artists. The one of these which 
particularly attracts our attention shows a group of 
little girls in white, seated at play among the wild 
flowers of the fields. A great pumpkin- vine twines 
through the flowers to where a hen with her brood of 
chickens is scratching about, while in the background 
we see the melon and onions the children have dropped 
from some basket, and a flock of turkeys gathered 
around them. The picture contains so much that is 
distinctly national, and is all so well put together 
that we stop long to admire it. 

We see here the original or Cermak's (ker'mak) 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



87 



famous painting of the Montenegrins carrying a fallen 
leader down the mountain-pass in a litter, and those 
of us who have made the Little Journey to the Balkans 
are deeply interested in it. 

There are other paintings, and a number of 
interesting Roman relics, 
over which we linger 
The cap-of -office of the 
Banus or Governor of 
Croatia is shown here; 
it is simply an exag- 
gerated drummer-boy \s 
shako, made of fur, and 
having an aigrette in the 
front. 

Agram is such a pret- 
ty city, with the long 
chestnut rows shading 
its residence streets, with 
its parks and its prom- 
enades, that we should 
imagine the people to 
be the happiest in Eur- 
ope. As a matter of 
fact, however, they are 

decidedly in ill humor; and as we hear them tell how 
they are compelled to pay taxes to Hungary, without 
receiving any benefits therefrom, and of the other 
wrongs they suffer, we recall at once the causes of our 
own Revolution, and our blood boils in sympathy for 
these patriots. 

After we have concluded our sight-seeing, by way 




ON THE MARKET, AGRAM 



88 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

of relaxation we take the little one-track horse car out 
among the alfalfa fields of the country, to Maximilian 
Park, a summer resort owned by the Archbishop of 
Agram, where the citizens hold picnics, soldiers' 
reunions, and the like, and on Sunday the promenaders 
gather to drink fresh cream or buttermilk and eat 
clabber, as summer tourists are fond of doing among 
the dells of Wisconsin. 

We are so lucky as to chance on such a picnic, and 
we are struck with its similarity to a harvest-home 
in one of our northern states. There are the long 
booths with eatables, there are the canes for the merry- 
makers to "ring,"' and the "nigger babies" to be shot; 
but, in addition, we see the picnickers gather about 
bonfires and roast pork chops on long iron bars, which 
is hardly a popular custom at home, though in a way 
suggestive of the barbecues of our own South. 

There is a little excursion out from Agram to Somo- 
bor (so'mo-bor), in the grape-cure country, which we 
enjoy. We go by narrow-gauge and then country bus 
to the town, which is really a mere village. Arrived 
there, our way leads up a delightful country road 
through the woods, to the entrance to the kur (koor) 
grounds, where we begin the climb of a steep "hill of 
digestion." In among the trees of a venerable forest 
we go, past the benches and tables of the grape-eaters, 
to a chalet at the top of the hill. 

Those of us who had no appetite to begin with have 
one now, and are ready to pay almost any price for 
the grapes which are offered. If we were patients, 
come for the cure, we should take so many pounds of 
the red, the green, and the ordinary blue grapes 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 89 

between meals, and so many after dinner or supper, at 
the same time regulating our diet according to what- 
ever complaint we might have. In America folk 
rather ridicule the grape-cure, but here it has many 
firm advocates. 

r From the heights where the grapes are eaten it is 
an easy walk to an old ruined castle, just like the 
castles along the Rhine, so we saunter among the 
remains of the ancient chambers, and climb the tur- 
rets, poking into this nook, exploring that, without a 
soul to say us nay. 

GIPSY LAND 

Returning to Agram, we prepare to continue our 
journey overland, towards the national capital. Our 
next stop, at Sissek (siss'seck), will be but a brief one. 
This village is the center of the gall-nut industry, and 
between trains we stop off to inspect the warehouses 
where the gall-nuts, those little products of the oak, 
are stored for the tanners' call. Otherwise Sissek has 
but little to interest one. We have seen the place in 
ten or fifteen minutes, in fact, and so we wander out on 
a delightful country road, recalling the bluegrass high- 
ways of Kentucky, to a castle, which by its shape 
reminds us of the Norman castles we visited in France. 
It is fast falling to decay, but we find tenants living in 
the few remaining rooms into which storm and wind 
cannot creep. 

But the gipsies are what interest us most on this 
ramble. We remember reading in St. Nicholas many 
years ago, a little poem about the gipsies, the real 
"Romany," and when in Rumania found the gipsies 



90 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 




A CROATIAN HOME, NEAR SISSEK 



living in such squalor we were sadly disappointed. 
We felt, in fact, that these people could not be the 
gipsies of whom we had read so much. Here in 
Hungary, or better, in Croatia, we meet the genuine 
gipsy, a dark race, so yellow as to resemble our own 
mulatto, and with the wild black locks flowing to the 
wind and the eagle eye of the Indian, but having a 
more musical voice. 

We find the gipsies living in wagons with gay-col- 
ored sides, such as pass now and then through our own 
Middle West, lighting their camp-fires in some shel- 
tered glade, where the happy, though poorly clad and 
seemingly half -starved women, cook the scanty meals. 
In the daytime the men chop the trees along the roads, 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



91 



sawing them up into boards, or fashioning them 
various-wise, while the women will stop to tell fortunes 
to the passer, or preferably run after his wagon to beg. 
When we get into the Carpathians we shall meet 
more of the gipsies, and even a wilder branch of the 
race, and there we shall find them begging for sugar, 
i. e., money with which to buy sugar or candy. Happy- 
go-lucky are these people, and when the cold, cruel 
winter comes to Croatia they will follow the birds 
southward to the lands of fez and turban. 

BUDAPEST THE BEAUTIFUL 

From Sissek, we continue by rail to Budapest, the 
national capital of Hungary, and next only to Paris 




THE REAL HUNGARIAN GIPSY 



92 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

and Berlin, the most beautiful city in Europe. We are 
to spend a good deal of time here, so we go about our 
sight-seeing in a methodical manner. We find that our 
guide-book omits certain things we care to see, and 
lists others we do not, so we shall take a map of the 




THE BLUE DANUBE AT BUDAPEST 

city, and, starting in one corner, work our way from 
point to point. 

In fact, unless we speak Magyar, we shall have to 
rely largely on our map. If we ask persons on the 
street, as politely as we can, in German, to direct us, 
they will snub us, believing that we are of the hated 
Austrians. If we ask them in French, they do not 
understand, and as for English, while a compara- 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 93 

tively large number of the better class speak our 
language, such persons must be searched for, and in 
times of doubt as to the right path are usually not to 
be found. 

In Budapest, moreover, we shall be forced fiom the 
outset to rely on ourselves. Curiously enough, at the 
depot there is not a single hotel omnibus to meet the 
train, and we have to hail a "cabby" to wheel us away 
to the hotel of our choice. We find this hotel to be 
almost American in its equipment, and in every way 
so much like the big hotels of New York that we feel 
quite at home. 

Our mail has been accumulating for us at this place, 
because in a journey such as this we never can tell 
beforehand just how long we shall stay in any one 
town, our limit being always as long as anything 
remains to be seen, and so friends have headed us off 
by mailing everything to Budapest. It takes a long 
time to read and answer letters when one is traveling 
far and seeing much, and we are busied with ours 
until the supper hour. 

Then we go out to our first real Magyar supper. 
The chief feature of the meal is, of course, guylas 
(goo'lash), the national dish. Guylas is any meat — 
preferably beef, but often lamb or chicken — boiled 
with mangoes and red peppers until it is a soft mass, 
and we find it very palatable indeed. 

We eat supper on the broad pavement in front of one 
of the cafes beside the Danube. In fact, all the time 
we are in Budapest we shall never eat indoors unless 
the weather prove inclement. Every cafe has tables 
upon these wide pavements, often surrounded by little 



94 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



■ ; M-;,8l 

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RESIDENCE STREET IN BUDAPEST, THE "CHICAGO OF EUROPE" 

hedges of boxwood or myrtle and shielded by awnings 
from the broiling sun. Here the Hungarians come, 
not so much to eat as to read over the great files of 
papers of all Europe that are always kept on hand, and 
to meet their friends and indulge in a quiet hour's chat. 
They do not eat and run, as do we; supper lasts far 
into the evening. . 

In those cafes music is furnished by gipsy bands, 
whose members do not, however, belong to the nomad 
race we met at Sissek, but are of another "stem," as 
the Magyars put it. We wish to hear the real gipsy 
music, and so we go to the best cafe, expecting, of 
course, to have it there. The band is excellent and 
the music well rendered, but "Teasing/' and "Hia- 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 95 

watha," and " Under the Bamboo Tree" are the airs 
we hear, for our American " rag-time" has penetrated 
to the heart of Europe and is driving out the national 
songs everywhere. 

Our sight-seeing begins in the heart of Budapest, in 
the shopping district. We walk up an elegant boule- 
vard lined with tall buildings five to seven stories high. 
Handsome stores occupy the ground floor of these 
buildings, while in the upper stories are apartments in 
which people live. The sidewalks are broad and there 
is a parkway down the middle of the street, with 
the electric cars on either side. In this park feature 
Budapest reminds us at once of Boston. 

As we turn into the Andrassy Strasse (an-drass-e 
strass'a), the finest boulevard and most important 
highway in the city, we notice that while all the stores 
of course have their signs and advertisements in the 
Magyar, a very large number have them in English 
also — this owing to the army of English and American 
tourists who visit Budapest each year. 

Along the Andrassy Strasse, or, as the Magyars 
would say, Andrassy Uhlica (66'le-ka), the stores in 
which novelties are sold attract us. We notice a 
music dealer's window and step in to look over his 
wares. As we enter, the opening door plays a strain 
of sacred music that puts us in a mood to buy almost 
anything we may be urged to take. We see little key- 
rings with a set of three keys, which prove on inspection 
to be a knife, a file, and a pencil, respectively ; and only 
twenty cents for the lot. Near by is a miniature Tatra 
(ta'tra) Mountain hat, which hides an ink-well. We pick 
up a tiny pistol, and pull the trigger ; a pencil comes out. 



96 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

For some future Little Journey into lands where we 
must camp out, a handy tool is offered us — a knife, 
seemingly, but one which comes apart and contains 
table-knife, fork, and spoon, penknife, corkscrew, and 
scissors, all in one. 

As we leave the store, a magnate, one of the Hun- 
garian nobility, dashes by in his landau, the driver 
and footman wearing his ancestral livery. Baggage- 
bearers in uniform, with whom the streets are filled, 
stand aside, and the innumerable hand-cart pushers 
make way for him. 

At a corner below the Opera House, which is closed 
at this season, we find a curious and very helpful 
establishment, bearing the sign of "Touristry Bureau." 
This is an office operated under the supervision of the 
government, to assist tourists in finding out what is 
worth seeing in Hungary — how to reach certain places, 
and when to go — and at the same sime insure their 
comfort. In addition, this bureau has the sale of 
native works of art, and when one buys from it he 
knows that the object comes from the exact place 
from which it is claimed to come, and that it is not the 
product of a factory, as too many of the souvenirs we 
buy from peasants elsewhere prove to be. As a result, 
the store of the bureau is a perfect museum of the 
native wares of Hungary, and we linger long before the 
cases of peasant needlework, pottery, and carving. 
Not far from the bureau are the headquarters of 
Uncle Sam in Hungary, the American Consulate- 
General, where our representative, Mr. Chester, has 
charge. If King Francis Joseph were in town and we 
wished to be presented to him, we should have to apply 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 97 

to Mr. Chester, who is the next thing to an ambassador, 
and, in fact, would be an ambassador if our country 
could recognize Austria and Hungary as two separate 
nations. 

We drop in upon Mr. Chester, and we are interested 
in asking him about Americans in Budapest. He tells 
us that American wares of many sorts are sold here, 
from hardware and typewriters down to shoe-polish 
and flypaper. As we continue our tour of the stores 
of Budapest we see abundant evidence of the truth of 
the statement, for down near the Danube, where 
the parliament houses loom up over the river, and the 
great bridges span the stream, there are little shops 
among the trees on the quay (like those we found 
along the Seine at Paris), and here everything that can 
possibly be made to bear an American label is styled 
an American product. 

In a dim two-story arcade, where flower-venders 
congregate, we stop to look over the toy-stores, but 
there are no toys here different from those at home; 
in fact, our old friend " Robinson Crusoe" is here, and 
American lawn-tennis balls are offered for sale. The 
jewelry shops, however, have their charms, for there 
the specialty is of mother-of-pearl, and we see lockets 
containing twelve circlets, each with one of the signs of 
the zodiac worked upon it, that sorely tempt our purses. 

It is twelve o'clock, and the shutters are being 
pulled down before all the stores, for eve^body stops 
work for the noon-hour. Only here and there is any- 
thing left open for us, and we rely for our sight-seeing 
on the peddlers of post-cards, who have novelties of 
every sort. A favorite Magyar insult is to call a man 



98 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

a " straw-head/' and so there are cards of curious 
people with heads of real straw under celluloid covers, 
to be sent for a joke. 

We watch the crowd surging by, and it appears to 
us most cosmopolitan. Among the men there seems to 
be a special hobby for gray felt hats. The children, as 
we see them on their way to school, are dressed in 
more sober colors than our little ones wear. Often 
several little girls will be dressed exactly alike, though 
probably not related, but only close friends. Customs 
here differ from ours more than costumes. When two 
ladies meet, each kisses the other's hand. A gentle- 
man, meeting a lady of his acquaintance, kisses the 
back of her hand. When two gentlemen meet, they 
take off their hats to each other, and should a man or 
boy of our party forget this on meeting a Hungarian 
acquaintance on the street, the carelessness would be 
taken as an insult. 

We are astonished by the number of carriages that 
pass, and by the swarms of newsboys everywhere. 
The many trackless street cars are another surprise to 
us. We follow the passing throng down to the river 
bank, where stands the Academy — a handsome three- 
story sandstone pile, facing a park in which is the 
statue of one of the patriots of Hungary. Across the 
park from the Academy is a small, three-story hotel, 
with the palace of the Count of Koburg for neighbor. 
Beyond are the Police Headquarters, and one of the 
large public baths of the city, while to the south we see 
the Chamber of Commerce, with a statue of Deak, the 
author, before it. 

This is the usual starting-point for the sight-seer in 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



99 



the city, and from here we follow the Franz Josef quay 
up among the cafes beneath the trees. Along here an 
electric car line has been built almost directly above 
the river, a huge wall descending sheer from the track 
to the wharves. The Danube here is muddy in color, 




A FIREMEN'S DRILL IN BUDAPEST 



and only on the rarest days, the loungers tell us, does 
it deserve the name "Blue Danube/ ' 

As we proceed up the banks, we have Ofen, the 
imperial suburb, across the river, on our right, while on 
the left great apartment houses stretch to the Re- 
doubten (ra-doot'en) Buildings, a sort of armory 
facing a park, in which is one of the popular outdoor 
cafes. A few more steps and we are at the Place of the 



100 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

Oath, where Franz Joseph took the oath as King of 
Hungary. When Hungary secedes from Austria, as 
there is great likelihood of her doing very shortly, this 
tiny park surrounded by tall buildings will probably be 
the center of interest for the entire world. 

We have but to cross a street to the City Hall of 
Budapest, and its beautiful frescoed ceilings, its 
heavily gilded woodwork, and the great bronze gratings 
before the doors recall some of the old mediaeval town- 
halls we saw in Germany. Beyond is the market, 
where the wares of the peasants are sheltered by big 
white umbrellas, and then the suspension bridge cross- 
ing the Danube to Of en. The river at this point 
reminds us of the St. Clair, because of its grain-boats 
— long, flat monsters that bring up the grain from the 
Rumanian and Bulgarian fields, and deposit it in 
handsome warehouses and elevators here. 

Beyond rise other magnificent buildings of buff 
brick set in little parks, and it is with astonish- 
ment we learn that these constitute the city slaughter 
houses, for Budapest operates its own butchering busi- 
ness, or requires the butcher to come here to do his 
slaughtering, and the institution is one of the famous 
ones of the world. Passing through these slaughter 
houses we are surprised at the number of Cape buffaloes 
in the pens, for in Hungary the flesh of these animals 
takes the place of beef to a large extent. 

We have now reached the upper end of the city. 
We return by another route to Andrassy Street, where, 
in the center of a wide boulevard, a policeman sits 
motionless on his horse the day through, an unfor- 
gettable feature to the Budapest promenaders. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 101 
JOTTINGS FROM OUR DIARY 

We have many odd things to jot down in oar 
note-books during our stay in Budapest. Going out 
one morning, we find all stores and shops closed, and 
learn that it is a Saint's day. In spite of this fact, 
bill-posters go about distributing hand-bills of an 
American Wild West Show. We wander in the direc- 
tion of the circus, and come on a religious procession, 
one of those held in seasons of drought by congrega- 
tions of certain churches, who parade the streets, 
carrying church banners and emblems, and singing 
their hymns as they go. For a moment the procession 
is stopped, and one of the immense Budapest moving- 
wagons, resembling a huge whaleback boat, and 
capable of carrying the furnishings of an entire house, 
crosses the street. 

As we pause at a corner, we notice a little girl buy- 
ing a bouquet of asters from a street vender ; for chil- 
dren here often spend their pocket-money on flowers 
— a thing our American children seldom do. At one 
place a sign indicating cures by the Finsen and 
Roentgen rays, interests us, as one of the very latest 
things in the medical line. Outside the Peoples' 
Theater we see some peasants who have come to town 
lounging about, the women in short black flowered 
skirts, and blue aprons bordered in red. These women 
wear no shoes and stockings, and as we pass they are 
cooling their feet in the streams of water from the 
firemen's hose. For the streets here are sprinkled 
thus twice a day; hence the wonderful cleanliness of 
Budapest. 



102 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

We find little in the east end of the city to interest 
us but the huge depot, with the statue of Barocs in 
the park at its side. Barocs was the man who made 
the Hungarian railways famous for what is known as 
the Zone System. He divided up the fares in Hungary 
so that no matter how far one travels, he does not pass 
through more than three zones. For any distance in 
the first belt, whether it be a mile or a dozen miles 
from the starting-point, one pays a given amount ; for 
any point in the second belt, again so much, and for 
any point in the third there is another fixed price. In 
this way the cost of traveling in Hungary is reduced to 
a minimum. 

THE CEMETERY 

Not far from this depot is the Kerepest Cemetery, 
one of the city's sights. Graves here do not lie under 
the sod, for the ground of the cemetery is barren, but 
each grave is marked by a square mound, perhaps six 
inches high, from the center of which there rises another 
hillock, possibly three feet in height, both of these 
mounds having grass on their sides and flowers on the 
top. In addition, at every grave there stands a 
wrought-iron lantern, on a pole possibly sixty inches 
high. These lanterns are lit on what corresponds to 
All Saints' Day — a feast celebrated here on the first of 
October, when everyone flocks to the graveyard. 

To us Americans, the first interest is the grave of 
Kossuth, Kossuth Ferenz, they call him here, for in 
Hungary the last name is always put first. (This fact 
accounts for the large number of Mr. Janoses, or 
Jameses, we at first believed to be in town, judging 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 103 

from the signs and advertisements.) Kossuth's grave 
consists of possibly a half-dozen very broad steps of 
stone, meant, perhaps, to be topped at some time with 
a statue, and the whole surrrounded by an iron railing. 
A new mausoleum, somewhat resembling Grant's 
tomb, is being erected now for Kossuth, the money 
coming from contributions collected by the news- 
papers all over the country. 

Where two of the cemetery roadways cross, we come 
upon a plain, half-neglected mound, without stone of 
any sort, and we pause, for here lies the great Hun- 
garian novelist Jokai. All the time we are in Hungary 
we shall hear so much of the case of Maurus Jokai that 
we had best learn the story at once. 

Jokai endeared himself to the Hungarian people by 
both his poetry and his dramas, but more particu- 
larly by his historical novels of Magyar life, most of 
which have been translated into every language, while 
not a few are given the students of European history 
in our own universities to read. That this writer was 
esteemed by others than his own people is shown by 
the fact that when he celebrated his fiftieth birthday, 
not so very many years ago, kings and emperors sent 
him gold and silver wreaths and other testimonials. i 

In his later life, after the death of his first wife, 
Jokai began writing plays, and it was while directing 
the staging of one of his dramas that he fell in love 
with a young actress of the capital and married her. 
Immediately there began to be circulated all sorts of 
stories of the young wife's cruelty tp the poor old man ; 
it was even said that when she was angry she would 
turn him out of the house, hungry and ill. The Hun- 



104 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

garian people grew indignant, but out of regard for the 
author's feelings nothing was done. Soon it was seen 
that he was declining, and not long ago he died, of a 
broken heart, very probably. 

Then the storm broke out, and there has followed 
between Jokai' s sympathizers and those of his wife 
what is known as a pamphlet war. Each party prints 
pamphlets for free or very cheap distribution, giving 
its side of the story, and then answering the latest 
facts brought out by their opponents. This war is now 
on in Hungary, and in every bookshop we find matter 
concerning the Jokai case. 

We meet Mrs. Jokai, and find her a charming young 
woman, who cries when she tells of the wrong that has 
been done her. She shows us the poems her husband 
wrote about her, and lets us look over his books and 
his keepsakes. 

A BUDAPEST RESORT 

From the cemetery we go through the heart of the 
" Chicago of Europe," a section of Budapest which 
is so termed by its citizens because of the vast number 
of well-built apartment houses all enclosing courts, off 
which are small shops that we should never suspect 
to exist in what appear to be residences pure and 
simple. 

Beyond this district, we come to the Stadt-Wald- 
chen (stat-valt'chen), one of the pleasure resorts of 
Budapest. Lawns and fountains are shaded by fine 
old sycamores, which meet overhead, and benches are 
scattered about, that the people may rest and lounge. 
Peddlers of every sort are here, from little girls selling 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 105 

queer brown toy monkeys, to Salvation Army singers, 
who have for sale the literature of their order. 

Surrounded by gorgeous beds of dahlias, coleus, and 
begonias, there is a series of buildings of exceptional 
interest to us as tourists. These were a part of the 
last exposition of Budapest, and have been allowed to 
remain standing, as examples of the architecture of 
Hungary at various periods in her history, the whole 
recalling at once "Old Paris/ ' built along the Seine 
during the last French exposition. Here, too, is the 
statue of Anonymous, the bronze figure of a seated 
man, his face hidden in a hood. Anonymous was the 
Venerable Bede of Hungary, leaving notes on her his- 
tory of incalculable value to the student of early times, 
but signing these only by that title. 

Restaurants where gipsy bands play ; a lake on which 
in the winter some four thousand people skate ; colored 
fountains, art museums, and the Millenium Monument 
help to make the park attractive. At the farther end, 
the subway cars come out from the ground, just as they 
do at one point in the public gardens in Boston. 

To return to our hotel we take a seat on the top of 
one of the busses that are so popular with the Buda- 
pesters, and which are almost as numerous in this 
section of the city as they are in Paris. In the evening 
we drop into the Cafe New York, the finest of the 
many cafes in the city, and watch the Magyars enjoy- 
ing their beverage — coffee. Almost as great coffee- 
topers as the Turks are these Hungarians, but here 
"milk-coffee" (coffee diluted with an equal quantity 
of milk) is what most people drink. As we overhear 
the conversation of the politicians and the journalists 



106 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

in their respective corners here, we find Austria to be 
the one subject of discussion. We hear so much talk of 
the wrongs Hungary suffers and of the misdeeds com- 
mitted by her fellow in the dual yoke, that we grow to 
feel that to be linked with Austria must be a hard fate 
indeed. 

THE ROYAL PALACES 

Another day we devote to Ofen, crossing the Danube 
on one of the magnificent bridges and then by a ser- 
pentine road climbing the hills on which the palaces 
are built. We might make the ascent in an elevator, 
such as is to be found in south Ohio. As we mount 
the hills, the lower section of Ofen, the Danube, and 
Pesth, with its academy and parliament buildings and 
domes and spires, and below, the curve in the river, all 
unfold into one charming bird's-eye view, and we feel 
that the climb is well worth while, if only for this. 

Passing the Ministries, which correspond to the 
offices of our executive departments, and in which 
there is nothing for us to see, we reach the palace, the 
Hungarian residence of the Hapsburgs. For block 
upon block there stretch magnificent buildings of 
marble and sandstone, some with terraced gardens, 
into which we may peep through ornamented gratings, 
and others closed to the sight-seer, and with guards in 
showy uniforms all about. The dome over the king's 
residence is surmounted by a crown that is visible for 
miles up and down the river. 

The streets between these buildings are well paved, 
and clean as those in any park in the United States, 
and there are police at every hand to prevent the 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 107 

slightest misdemeanor. The Ministries and the arch- 
bishop's palace, the coronation church, and the sentry 
barracks, are all built to form one magnificent whole 
that is tantalizing because of the "No Admittance" 
signs that stare one in the face. Elsewhere in Buda- 
pest soldiers are conspicuous by their absence. 

From the palaces we saunter on to a cafe built on 
these heights because of the magnificent view of the 
Lower Danube which they command, and here the 
people of the capital gather at sunset to dine and wine 
and enjoy the panorama of city and river, and low, 
flat Hungarian plain. 

AWAY FROM BEATEN PATHS 

As ill-luck will have it, the Hungarian parliament is 
not in session in the summer. We visit the great 
parliament buildings on the Danube, but find the 
session chambers much like those we have seen else- 
where in Europe. It is in the members of this assem- 
bly that we are interested ; we are told that when they 
become excited in debate they rise from their desks and 
shout wildly at one another, shaking their fists and 
raving like madmen. Only the leaders seem able to 
take things coolly. Of order there is none; one man 
speaks and others chime in ; members of the opposition 
hoot and hiss; while those of the speaker's party 
applaud. How the stenographers are able to keep the 
faintest sort of record of what is really said on the floor 
is a mystery. 

Since it is impossible for us to witness this interesting 
spectable, we plan a little side excursion up into the 
Carpathians, as a change from the monotony of city 



108 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



sight-seeing. These mountains, we remember, are the 
scene of many of Jokai's stories, so we are especially 
interested in visiting them. 

To begin with, we have a railway ride of some hun- 
dred and seventy miles from Budapest to Kassa 
(kash'a), out through the grain lands, the rolling Hun- 
garian prairies, where only an occasional white-walled, 
red-roofed village, or a hedge or locust tangle, breaks 
the endless rolling surface of the earth. At Kassa we 
change cars for Poprad (pop'rat), the center for the 
summer-resort country of the Hohe Tatra (ho'a ta'tra) 
Mountains. 

On this latter part of the journey we meet with one 
of the natural phenomena of Hungary — the fields 




A BUDAPEST GENTLEMAN AND HIS WIFE IN THE HOHE TATRA 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 109 

sloping up the ever-rising mountains in stretches of 
brown and yellow and green, but with a peculiar vel- 
vety effect such as we have seen nowhere else in the 
world. So beautiful is this play of colors on what 
seem to be terraces of the mountain sides, that we pay 
little heed to anything else, even neglecting the peasants 
in their gaudy costumes, at the stations. We do 
notice, however, that most of the men of this region are 
dressed completely in blue, save for the long sleeves of 
a white shirt projecting through the vest and a black 
slouch hat, worn well down on the head. 

We are exceedingly surprised, on arriving at Poprad, 
to find every one speaking, not Magyar, but German — 
the more so after the way we had been treated at the 
capital when we made use of German. The explana- 
tion lies in the fact that this whole region is not Magyar, 
but Saxon, the people being descendants of Saxons 
who were called in here by one of the early Hungarian 
kings to assist him in repelling an invasion. They 
were then given land and settled here, and their 
descendants retain their language and customs. There 
are in all sixteen Saxon towns, known as the Zips 
cities, and they are almost as independent as the old 
free cities. 

Poprad, the map informs us, lies at the kernel of the 
Hohe Tatra, the highest of the Carpathian Mountains. 
In the last few years the summer tourists have been 
coming into these mountains, being encouraged to do 
so through the efforts of .an association formed by the 
people of all these towns, who see to it that guides do 
not overcharge or hotels worst the stranger, and in 
many ways add to one's comfort. 



110 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 







4, 


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If r 


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PEASANTS OF SIEBENBURGEN (TRANSYLVANIA) 

-» 

From our rooms in the hotel we see the mountains, 
with the clouds about them, inviting us to come and 
explore. Before accepting the invitation we dine on 
true mountain fare, mushrooms and venison, until we 
have satisfied the most violent longings any of us may 
have had for either of these dainties. 

As we venture forth to see the little town, we are 
struck by the intensely German character of the place. 
The old men smoke curved German pipes, the children 
play as German children do, and even the signs on the 
doors are in German. We watch the little ones skip- 
ping rope, and learn of their day's work. In season, 
all the children go out into the mountains to gather 
bark and herbs and simples, from which are com- 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 111 

pounded delicious mountain drinks and specialties 
unknown to the rest of Europe. Berries likewise are 
brought in and put up by the peasants. 

Our sight-seeing begins at the town museum, where 
t are preserved specimens of the flora and fauna of the 
r region. Foxes and squirrels, eagles and hedgehogs, 
are grouped together with relics of the Stone Age and 
the Iron Age in a medley that is more picturesque 
than scientific. A bird whose feathers are sky blue, 
changing to violet, attracts our attention especially, 
and we are also interested in the Alpine butterflies, 
small though most of them are. 

From Poprad we go for a delightful drive out into 
the Hohe Tatra to the Ice Cavern. This drive is one 
of the most beautiful we have ever taken. The road 
winds through dense and virgin forests, broken only 
here and there by lumber camps, where strange-look- 
ing, simple-hearted Slavoks — with long, tangled hair 
emerging from hats so broad-brimmed as to remind us 
of those of the Spanish toreadors — are at work cutting 
the trees into lumber. When we stop at an inn it is to 
find ourselves beset by the gipsies — not the picturesque 
gipsies of Sissek, but a dirtier, even wilder race, whose 
little ones follow our carriage for miles, slapping their 
faces until the tears start, to enlist our pity and induce 
us to give them "sugar." 

The peasant women of the little hamlets en route 
take our fancy, for they are one blaze of pink; dress 
and head-kerchief and stockings (when any are worn) 
are all of a beautiful roseate hue, that is as character- 
istic of the region as lavender is of Bucarest and white 
is of Agram. 



112 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

The Ice Cavern, too, is a curiosity worthy of our 
attention. For centuries the people of this region had 
noticed that the ice seemed to linger longer here in the 
spring than elsewhere, but no especial attention was 
paid to the fact. Some few decades ago, however, a 
gentleman set out to investigate, with the result that 
he came on an immense cavern, which apparently was 
completely rilled with ice. An entrance was cut into 
this great mine of frozen water, and within the mass 
of ice there were discovered huge bubbles, so large as 
to form rooms. 

Through the ice chambers we are taken. In order to 
prevent people from slipping, a wooden walk has been 
laid over the ice, with steps leading from one "bubble" 




THE PINK COSTUMES OF THE ZIPS COUNTRY 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 113 

up or down into the next, and there is a railing to 
which we may cling. The strange part about the 
cavern is that every summer, as the sun's heat pene- 
trates the earth, a certain amount of the ice melts, but 
in the winter the loss is mysteriously replaced, though 
not from without, and so in the ages the cave has been 
neither filled nor emptied; in fact, so permanent is it 
that arc -lights have been placed in the larger cham- 
bers. In winter people from all Hungary come to the 
cavern to skate on its frozen floors. 

After our visit to the cave we have luncheon at a 
typical Magyar mountain hotel, built in the Swedish 
style, with broad shaded verandas, from the steps of 
which tempting little paths lead off into the wildwood. 
The dining-room is decorated with antlers and mounted 
deers' heads, as are some of the rooms in our own 
White Mountain hotels, and here we enjoy venison 
fresh from the forest. 

We return to Poprad by a roundabout way, in order 
to pass through Blumenthal (bloom'en-tal), a hamlet 
of neat cottages and a little church, set in a great 
mountain meadow, with tall blue peaks towering all 
around. Some of us who years ago were readers of 
BeljoroVs Annual for Young Folks recall a delightful 
little love story, a The Merry Bells of Blumenthal," 
about a young Saxon of this village who went out to 
seek his fortune while his sweetheart remained behind, 
keeping house for the old pastor. Blumenthal is just 
such a place as the story describes, and we would fain 
linger here. 

Returning to Poprad, we start for another section of 
the Austro-Hungarian summerland. We are to visit 



114 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

the three Schmecks cities, mountain summer resorts 
closely resembling our own in the Alleghenies. In a 
curious electric car, having no track, but furnished 
with heavy rubber tires and operated by means of a 
trolley connecting with wires strung along one side of 
the road, we are carried up a country turnpike filled 
with hay-wagons and truck-gardeners' carts and wan- 
dering peddlers, to Old Schmecks. 

There are Old Schmecks, New Schmecks, and Lower 
Schmecks, the three forming what is practically one 
town, and we feel as though we were on a sort of 
vacation jaunt in the midst of our Little Journey as we 
wander among the fountains and the gardens, the 
lovers' lanes leading through the forests to belvederes 
commanding wide mountain views, and the booths 
where are displayed tempting hand-carved souvenirs, 
and the like. If we wished, we might indulge in curi- 
ous mountain-baths — pine-needle baths, the water of 
which is a deep, dark brown, a tea, as it were, brewed 
of pine needles; and cone baths, and any number of 
others. 

Once more we return to Poprad, and there take the 
train to Csorba (tschor'ba), which is much like the 
Schmecks resorts. The ride is an exceedingly short 
one, and it seems but a few moments before we are 
deposited at the foot of the cog railway which makes 
the ascent to the Csorba See (sa), one of the famous 
Magyar lakes. We are now in the heart of the moun- 
tains, and our companions are all people who are pre- 
pared to " rough it." Men with knapsacks on their 
shoulders, and bearing stout alpenstocks, women in 
short skirts, or even bloomers, guides and porters, are 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 115 

our fellow-passengers in the car. All of them are bent 
on scaling the peaks, and we, too, shall have a taste of 
mountain-climbing. The cog ends at the Lake of 
Csorba, enclosed on every side by tremendous granite 
mountains, without sign of vegetation and with broad 
patches of snow everywhere. It gives us a thrill of 
delight to look up at these peaks. 

We saunter among the government hotels on this 
beautiful upland lake, and then follow a little forest 
path into the wilderness, mile on mile, to the Popper 
(po'per) See. It grows dark as we ascend ever higher 
into the mountains, and only the light of the moon, 
filtering through the trees, and in the denser glades 
the trusty alpenstock, enable us to pick the path. As 
we go on and on, the increasing altitude makes itself 
felt, and our breath comes shorter, and we tire more 
and more easily. The frogs are singing on the shore 
of the lake among the peaks, when a light far ahead 
reveals our goal, the little hotel of the Popper See. 

We spend the night here, at the last civilized point on 
the heights. Just at bed-time a storm comes up sud- 
denly, and as the spray of the waves dashes against our 
windows, which overhang the water, and we hear the 
mountain wind roaring through the bending pines, we 
think of " William Tell," and the tempest on the lake 
in the Swiss mountains, as described by Schiller. 

We rise early next morning, for we are to ascend the 
Meerauger Spitze (mare'ow-ger'spit-sa), one of the 
giant peaks of the Carpathians. Armed only with 
bags of eatables, on our backs, our cameras, and alpen- 
stocks, we begin the ascent. From the starting-point 
the peak seems so near that we hardly believe the 



116 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

guides when they tell us we shall be many hours 
reaching it. We tread first grassy meadows; then 
areas where only a peculiar lichen makes green and, in 
fading, brown, the mountain sides; and finally a land 
of rocks, reminding us of parts of Mammoth Cave by 
its jumble of boulders. 

We reach the peak on which our eyes have been 
fixed, only to find it is but a side spur of the Meer- 
auger, after all, and that we must descend to another 
lake, the Frog Lake (so named for a rock on its shore 
which resembles a sitting frog), far below; then begin 
our climb again. 

On the next ascent we go slowly — oh, so slowly! 
Every step is too much for us, and we are very thirsty, 
but the guides will not hear of our drinking from the 
clear, icy brooks flowing down from the snow at our 
side. Nor will they allow us to wet our parched lips 
with the snow at our side, claiming that to do so would 
do our lungs irreparable injury. And so we go on, and 
on, and on ! 

Towards the last the task becomes almost too much 
for us. It is a hand-over-hand climb, over boulders, 
along narrow ledges of rock, up and down, in and out, 
and roundabout, until we vow that what pleasure 
people can find in climbing mountains we fail to see. 

Ever and anon we pause to watch the chamois, run- 
ning in herds on opposite cliffs, or standing up against 
the sky on the very tip of a crag, and uttering their 
peculiar cry. The view is growing more and more 
gorgeous, as the sun shines on the mountains all about. 
Finally we reach the summit, and the entire panorama 
is unfolded. Everywhere below us are the peaks, and, 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 117 




NEAR THE ISKER PASS, OUT OF TRANSYLVANIA 

on one hand, we are actually looking down into 
Poland. 

While we lunch here on the mountain-top, we can 
enjoy the spectacle, the clouds playing on the peaks — 
now uncovering one and shrouding the next, now 
revealing an unsuspected range or chain, and then 
again turning to fog and gossamer and rising up to 
our feet, so that below us there is only vacancy. 

From a height of 2,503 meters above the sea we 
begin the descent, and it is much more rapid than 
was the upward climb. As we go down, the air 
grows denser and we tire less easily; we may drink 
now, too, at every brook; and so, strange to say, our 
strength returns, and when the base of the mountain 



118 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

is again reached, we are almost as fresh as when we 
started upward, long hours ago. Our Hungarian 
friends make musical this ride by songs, and to our 
surprise the tune of one of these is our own "John 
Brown's Body/' which, it seems, is really a national 
air of theirs. 

From the top of the Meerauger Spitze, back via the 
Popper See, the Lake of Csorba, Csorba town, and 
Poprad, to Budapest is a long retracing of steps, but 
we enjoy it thoroughly, for we need not be bothered 
now with taking notes or watching for " catches" for 
our cameras, while things which interest us most can 
be fixed more firmly in our memories by a second 
glance. 

Where to go from Budapest is a question to be 
debated. Again, the immensity of the Austro-Hun- 
garian Empire confronts us — this, and the fact that, 
whichever way we go, we shall have to make a long 
retracing of our route, in order to see other sections. 
There is the Danube, with the lands of fez and turban 
just below to tempt us, and the whistle of the boats, 
ready to take us on to Rumania and Servia, to Bul- 
garia, and, if we will, almost to the Black Sea, stirs 
every drop of nomad blood left in our veins from 
distant ancestors, and urges us to explore. 

TRANSYLVANIA 

We cannot, however, leave Franz Josefs land as yet, 
and so we go on eastward into Transylvania— or, as 
the natives call it, Siebenburgen (see'ben-btir'gen). 
This is Jokai's land, and those of us who have read 
"The Golden Age in Siebenburgen/ ' " Among the 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



119 



Wild Carpathians/' and others of his stories are 
exceedingly anxious to see this province of mystery 
and glamour. 

Our first peep, however, disappoints us. We stop 
off at Klausenburg (klow'sen-boorg), because we have 
been told it is a 
typical Magyar 
town. We do not 
doubt the truth 
of the statement, 
after having seen 
the place, and do 
not care to waste 
time in any other 
of the sort. Long 
rows of sandstone 
houses, set side 
by side, with the 
roofs sloping 
streetward, and 
a few trees here 
and there, sun- 
baked asphalt 
avenues, a little 
park, a church, 
and a few large public buildings, and we have seen 
the entire city. In fact, even between trains, we can- 
not find enough to occupy our time, and drop into the 
cafe of the " Hotel New York' ' to read over the papers 
in order to make the hours pass more agreeably. 

Going from Klausenburg to Kronstadt is like passing 
from this prosaic old world of ours into a fairy city, a 




SAXON TOWN HALL, TRANSYLVANIA 



120 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

dear old German town made up of little painted houses 
and curious old rathskeller (rahts'kel-ler), and a town 
church in the middle of the main square. In this 
square women sell gingerbread men and candy boys, 
and the chimney-sweep calls and the pretzel-vender 
cries his wares. Here and there the upper stories of 
the gabled houses project, and there is heavy timber, 
quaintly carved, set into the eaves, while below hang 
swinging flower urns, or there is a portico filled with 
"green things." Beyond the town tower the moun- 
tains, the Carpathians, beautiful, too, with their fading 
heather and the beach forests turned to brown and 
gold ; and looking up the road to w T here a little bridge 
spans a mountain streeam, on can readily imagine 




NEAR BRENNDORF, THE CITY OF BEETS 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 121 

himself back in the Transylvania of the time of robber- 
knights and barons and feudal obligations. 

From Kronstadt we make an interesting excursion 
countryward to Brenndorf, the town of beets. On 
every hand, as far as the eye can see, run long, seem- 
ingly endless, rows of beets. Here men and women 
and children are busy gathering the vegetables, first 
into great heaps, where other workers cut the leaves 
from the bulbs, and then taking them off in ox-carts 
to the sugar refinery, where the famous beet-sugar of 
Brenndorf is made. The sugarmakers, however, are 
not an obliging folk, and aside from a glance at the 
immense buildings stretching along either side the 
road, we cannot hope to see much of the sugar industry. 

Again we turn back on our route, returning to 
Kronstadt, then to the Magyar capital, where we go up 
the Danube to Vienna, the capital of Austria. 

VIENNA 

Vienna is one of the most beautiful cities in the 
world. Its especial pride is the famous Ringstrasse, 
following the line of the old city fortifications, and 
today a magnificent boulevard. The Ringstrasse is 
about two miles long, and possibly two hundred feet 
wide. It has a promenade in the center, flanked by 
trees, while either side is bordered by the handsomest 
buildings, taken as a whole, in the Empire. 

Cafes like those at Budapest are scattered along the 
Ringstrasse and the narrow streets leading from it, and 
we find metropolitan life here much as it is in the other 
great centers of Europe, except that the Austrians are 
the most affable, most courteous people in the world, 



122 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



IMPERIAL PALACE VIENNA 



so that in a journey through their land one is spared 
the little indignities which travelers suffer elsewhere, 
and which cause visitors to leave a place before they 
have really seen all it offers them. 

Sight-seeing in Vienna usually starts with St. 
Stefen's Church, one of the most magnificent houses of 
worship in Europe ; and is continued on to the Graben 
(gra/ben), now the heart of the shopping district of the 
city, but a center of town life almost as far back as the 
thirteenth century, when the Hapsburg line first 
established its seat at Vienna, and taking its name 
from the old moat which prior to that time occupied 
the site. Of the old buildings on the Graben, but few 
remain for our inspection; but here is a monument to 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 123 

commemorate the cessation of the plague, around 
which, until not so many years ago, town markets 
were held. This monument interests us for its pecu- 
liar conception of figures among the clouds. 

As at Budapest, our sight-seeing includes a shopping 
excursion, and we are interested in noting the various 
Russia leather articles for sale. There are purses, 
shopping-bags, knife cases, and the like, that make us 
wish we had an unlimited amount of pocket-money to 
spend on souvenirs for our friends. 



THE HAPSBURG PALACES 

Of course, we wish to see the Royal palaces, but 
after having visited Of en the beautiful, we join with 
the Magyars in wondering why it is that Franz Josef 
prefers the din- 
gy, dilapidated 
Hofburg of 
Vienna to the 
beautiful home 
built for him 
over the Dan- 
ube, farther 
down stream. 
Aside from 
statuary on the 
front and the 
historical asso- 
ciations of the 
Palace, which has cradled this family of Austrian mon- 
archs since twelve hundred and something, there is real- 
ly nothing to make the palace seem better than the 




IN THE AUSTRIAN EMPEROR'S HOME 



124 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

palazzios of the higher classes of nobility of poverty- 
stricken, dirty Italy. 

Natural history museums, and a library containing 
some four hundred thousand volumes, are open for 
inspection, and we spend considerable time over the 
great collection of wood-cuts (possibly three hundred 
thousand in all) which are shown in the latter. 

Those of us who visited the Sultan's treasury at 
Constantinople are anxious to see the royal treasury of 
Austria, and an impressive sight it is. One enters a 
hall hung with gorgeous robes of the imperial heralds 
since the time when the Empire was young, then 
passes by the collection of royal orders, and finally 
reaches the jewels themselves. The collection of which 
they are a part ranges in variety and date from the 
crown, scepter, and robes of Charlemagne down to those 
of Franz Josef. Diamonds and rubies and emeralds 
are everywhere, and especially showy is one order — 
that of the Golden Fleece — in which, we are told by 
the guide, not less than a hundred and fifty diamonds 
are set. 

Passing the Court Theater, we make our way to the 
Prater (pra-ter), of which we have heard so much. 
The Prater has been a park for some eight centuries, 
but for only a little over a hundred years have people 
other than the nobility been allowed to enter it. 
Nowadays it is given over to merriment; there are 
little dumb-shows, venders and fakirs, cafes and res- 
taurants on every hand. So gay is the scene here 
that we linger long, taking supper in the park, and 
spending the evening in quiet enjoyment . 

Vienna still has much to detain us. There is a 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 125 

votive church, built in thanks for the Emperor's 
escape from death at the hands* of an assassin. The 
building faces a plaza, or, as the Viennese say, Platz, 
named for Maximilian, whose home at Miramar we 
visited. From this plaza it is not far to the great 
Viennese stock exchange, the scene of the celebrated 
panic of a quarter of a century ago. Both the church 
and the stock exchange, however, interest us chiefly 
for their handsome exteriors, and to see them does not 
require more than a few moments in passing. The 
Opera House is another of the great structures of the 
city, built to accommodate some three thousand peo- 
ple, and at a cost roughly estimated at six million 
gulden. The university and the parliament houses 
likewise are architectural models of their sort. 




GRAND OPERA HOUSE, VIENNA 



126 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 




PARLIAMENT BUILDINGS, VIENNA 

Vienna, however, is a metropolis, and big cities, we 
have found, are very, very much alike the world over. 
The streets here, fine as they are, are tiring to our feet ; 
the hum and thrum and bustle is more wearying than 
is sight-seeing in a smaller place, and we should be 
happy indeed to get back among the peasants. We 
make an ascent of the Kalenberg (ka/len-berg), the 
great pleasure garden on a bluff, for a final view of 
Vienna, and then prepare to leave. 

A JAUNT INTO THE TYROL 

We are anxious for a taste of the genuine Teuton life 
of Austria, and so we hie us westward to the Tyrol, a 
land of mountains again — a summer-land of hotels and 
drives and belvederes. We shall make Innsbruck, the 
ancient capital, our headquarters, and from here go on 
various excursions. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 127 




HOFER MONUMENT, NEAR INNSBRUCK 



At Innsbruck 
we see soldiers 
everywhere. As 
we are taking a 
stroll before 
breakfast, we 
suddenly note 
that all the peo- 
ple on the street 
are removing 
their hats. Then 
a landau dashes 
by, accompanied 
by four mounted 
orderlies in white 

uniforms trimmed with red, and a bystander explains 
that the carriage contains a high officer of the gar- 
rison. Others of the soldiers wear a blue-gray suit, 
much like those of our mail carriers at home, with 
a band of red about the arm and one of green at the 
neck, to which is added a cap of gray, bearing a green 
tassel which hangs down upon the shoulder. Prettier 
still are the dark green caps with cock feathers all 
about, worn by another branch of the service. 

This is an interesting town. On every hand rise 
large old dwellings, without a sign of a yard, but often 
made picturesque by paintings — floral and other designs 
— upon the walls facing the street, done in the gayest 
colors. Women wearing spotless white waists, black- 
braided corsages, dark skirts, and broad black hats, 
come out of the doorways, making their way past the 
Rathhaus, a modern building, to the Hofkirche 



128 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

(hof'keerch-a), or church attended by the royal court 
when it is in Innsbruck. If we should follow them at 
this time we should not be able to do much sight- 
seeing beyond catching a glimpse of the Hofer Monu- 
ment erected to the memory of the Tyrolese patriot, 
of whose deeds we have often read, for at mass the 
church is crowded. So we ramble on past the university 
and arsenal, and the royal residence, which is closed to 
sight-seers, and into the delightful public park, enclosed 
by gratings, in which old sycamores, elms, and lindens 
and chestnuts throw a grateful shade on the prome- 
nader among the fountains and the flower-beds. 

A street-car comes along, marked "For Hall in 
Tyrol/ ' and we jump aboard. The car is not like our 
surface street cars, but more like the elevated railway 
trains of New York and Boston — four cars, in series, 
drawn by an old-fashioned dummy engine. We are 
carried through the prettier part of Innsbruck, and we 
are amazed to see that the very ancient custom of put- 
ting those gay color patterns on house exteriors, which 
has been dropped for centuries, is again in vogue ; where 
a house is nearing completion, the decorators are 
already busy. 

Beyond the town rise the barren, snow-capped 
mountains, with the wild little Inn River running at 
their base. Pretty gardens in which grow tiger lilies 
and roses and callas border the stream, behind peak- 
roofed homes, only the upper story of each having a 
porch, and that shaded by a shutter-like screen. The 
royal salt-works and the great woolen-mills are here on 
the outskirts, representing the principal industries of 
Innsbruck. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 



129 



Returning, we cannot resist the temptation of 
dropping into one of the great beer-gardens, where 
the military bands play their liveliest and gaiety pre- 
vails. The beer-gardens are a distinct feature of life 
in this land, it must be remembered, just as cafes are 
characteristic of 
Budapest. Over 
the beer, men 
plot and plan 
business and 
politics ; over the 
beer their wives 
arrange parties 
and the affairs 
of the home; 
over the beer 
lovers meet and 
students quarrel, 
duels are fixed, 
and disagree- 
ments patched 
up ; in fact, everything that makes up the hum and 
thrum of existence goes on here. If we watch the 
younger men carefully, especially those whose cheeks 
bear scars received in duels and who wear little round 
caps that mark them as students, and, as such, 
members of particular corps or associations, we shall 
find them indulging in drinking-contests to see who 
can drink the most glasses of beer. 

In the afternoon we drive out into the real Tyrol, 
among the quaint, German-speaking peasantry of the 
" back-country." The vehicle in which we go is a 




ONE OF THE PAINTED HOUSES 



130 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

plain mountain hack, and we are driven into the 
mountains almost at once. An old ruin, a counterpart 
of the robber castles of the Rhine, rises on one of the 
lower peaks, and then man's hand has no further part 
in the scene, for we enter the wilderness. 

Mighty mountains, covered with evergreen forests, 
are all about us, the wild flowers growing at their feet, 
beautiful as only mountain flowers can be. In fact, 
we are constantly tempted to help the horses up hill by 
walking, in order to gather these posies to press and 
send home to friends. A blue clover, the elecapitaine, 
white and yellow melilot, harebells and bluebells, a 
yellow pea, and countless other blossoms make redolent 
the wayside. 

In the heart of this forest we suddenly come upon a 
wayside tavern, a large, two-story building, on the 
front portico of which people are dining. As we drive 
up to the door we pass a woman and a dog harnessed 
together to a cart. Here in what is now the inn (as a 
tablet on the wall informs us), Andreas Hofer, the 
William Tell of the Tyrol, was born, and here, in 1809, 
he had his headquarters. 

We have now entered the famous Stubai (stoo-ba/e) 
Thai, one of the most magnificent valleys, scenically 
considered, in the world. On every hand the chains 
roll off from the blue, brimming Inn. Above, the 
clouds break on ice-clad peaks that tempt one to 
explore. Away up on the crest of one of these peaks, 
seemingly in the center of the valley, a hotel is built, 
and here we take luncheon, the while enjoying the 
panorama before us. 

Of course, all this country is associated with Andreas 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 131 

Hofer and the battles of the peasants against the 
French and Bavarians in the Tyrol, between the 
months of May and August of 1809 — a fight for liberty 
with which, it is to be hoped, all American boys and 
girls are familiar. 

In the hallway of the hotel antlers and implements 

/ of the chase are hung, and upon one wall is tacked one 
of the old German mottoes, in which country hotels in 

. Austria delight. In German the motto rhymes : 

Dies Hauses Schmuck ist Reinlichkeit ; 
Dies Hauses Gluck, Zufriedenheit; 
Dies Hauses Segen, Frommigkeit.* 

Everywhere in the Tyrol one sees these mottoes. 
Our eyes sweep the valley with its chalets, whence 
rises the tinkle of goat bells ; they pass on up to where 
two huge glaciers break a slope and then fall on a 
dwelling nearby. On its walls, on either side of the 
door, is printed in the quaint German type this legend : 

Ich habe gebaut nach meiner Sinn, 
Und es gafallt mir wohl darin; 
Gar mancher shauts und tadelt dran. 
Er mag es besser wenn er kann. 

This we may translate so : 

I have built according to my taste, 
And I am well pleased with it; 
Many look at it and criticize, — 
Let them improve it, if they can. 

From the hotel we may walk to a summer-house, 
where a mosaic table, standing at a height of exactly 
1,026 meters above the sea, contains a key to all the 
view. On a map of mosaic-work the various peaks 

* "This house's ornament is cleanliness; this house's fortune, contentment; this 
house's blessing, piety." 



132 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

are shown, and, below, the height of each is given. 
A party of tourists who are spending their vacation 
afoot, tramping from place to place, scan this closely 
in preparation for their next pilgrimage. 

We drive back to Innsbruck in the quiet of evening, 
that we may watch the after-glow on the mountains, 
making a detour to view a handsome bronze monu- 
ment of Hofer, on a height where the soldiers hold 
their targetry practice. A little museum, containing 
Hofer relics and trophies of the Austrian Jager (ya/ger) 
corps of the army, is close by, and those of us who are 
not too tired ramble about looking over the collections. 

We spend one day sight-seeing in Innsbruck itself. 
The usual plan is to start with the Women's Church, 
interesting because of the old-fashioned samplers, 
worked with the German words for "Mary has helped/ ' 
which are hung on a rail across the interior by the 
women worshipping here, as penitential offerings. It 
was in this church that the Emperor Maximilian I 
worshipped when each year he went in retreat, garbed 
as a monk, to the neighboring monastery. We visit 
the monastery later, and are shown his bed and chair. 

Again we are interested in the shops. One of the 
most wonderful things in the world is here to tempt 
those of us who have anything left in our purses — 
a cloth actually woven from cobwebs, on which are 
painted views of Innsbruck! This fabric is the work 
of a young peasant of an adjacent valley. Tiroler 
majolicas, burnt and carved wood novelties, and, for 
the hungry, a honey that is almost black in color, are 
other specialties offered us. Little cages for insects 
and botanic drums also are numerous, being bought 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 133 

by the school-children, who are fond of studying 
botany and zoology. 

There are several small churches we might visit, but 
the Hofkirche is the finest of all. Four marble pillars 
at either side of the central aisle stretch off from the 
door, and between them one sees, against each side 
wall, twenty-eight life-size bronze men-at-arms, wear- 
ing quaint armor and equipped with old-fashioned 
weapons. Extending across the body of the church 
are the pews, high and stiff, as was the fashion when 
the church was built. In the center of the church is 
the tomb of the Emperor Maximilian I (though he is 
buried at Vienna). Eight marble tablets depicting 
scenes from his life are cut in two rows about the sides, 
between pillars of a black stone, the whole surrounded 
by a handsome grating. 

In the back part of the church, beneath a monu- 
ment on which are represented the mountaineers 
cheering him, Andreas Hofer is buried, while a tablet 
close by records the deeds of his compatriot, Joseph 
Speckbacher. It is the very popular custom over the 
more central part of the Continent to bury the great 
in the churches, and so here Hofer lies in an edifice 
which since the time of its erection, way back in 1553, 
has been the pride of the province. 

THE FAR WEST AND UPPER AUSTRIA 

We scan our map carefully. We are now at the far 
western extremity of the great Austro-Hungarian 
Empire. Just a few miles more, as travelers under- 
stand the word "few," and we shall be in Switzerland, 
Bavaria, or Italy. Looking back at the territory we 



134 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

have visited — Istria, Carniola, and Croatia, hovering 
close together just to the east ; Dalmatia, on the south, 
with Bosnia* for boundary; Hungary, that great 
leviathan lying next toward the east, which we have 
penetrated to Transylvania — we are at a loss as to 
which way to turn. 

A bit more to the north is the province of Lower 
Austria, and we saw Lower Austria when we saw 
Vienna, for that city is the center of everything in the 
province. Only Salzburg, with the city of that name, 
and upper Austria, with the town of Linz and the 
Traun (trown) See, remain, and then we may away to 
the far north of the Empire. 

Salzburg is a beautiful city, with wide promenades 
and broad, well-paved streets. It is hemmed in by 
hills, from the top of which there are splendid views to 
be had, and on most of these hilltops cafes have been 
built. The city has its Hofburg or governor's palace, 
its town museum, and the like, as all Austrian cities 
have, but what interests us most are the home of 
Mozart and a museum of mementoes of his career. 
There is one thing for which we must give the Aus- 
trians credit : in every town where a great man in any 
line of work has arisen, we find them perpetuating his 
memory by preserving his home, and erecting in honor 
of him museums, monuments, and statues. 

A brief excursion to the Traun See is refreshing now, 
for the beauty of the lake, hemmed in by the moun- 
tains, is such as to remind us of the Italian lakes not 
so very far to the southward. 

* Bosnia: An Austrian province in all but fact; but visited on our "Little Journey 
to the Balkans" and so omitted on this trip. 



A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 135 
MORAVIA AND BOHEMIA 

We are now prepared for a long railway ride across 
Moravia, a province so wholly agricultural that it 
would be almost unknown to Americans were it not 
for a band of emigrants from here who made their way 
into our Alleghenies many years ago, and who have 
there preserved the ancient rites. Their church fes- 
tivals, notably the Easter service, have some peculiari- 
ties that are interesting to the stranger. We, however, 
are far from the Eastertide now, and so do not halt in 
this province. 

Our way leads north to Prague, the capital of Bohe- 
mia, and almost the very northermost point of the 
Empire. Once we have seen Prague we can well say 
that we have seen all that is worth the attention of the 
tourist and the careful traveler in Francis Joseph's 
great monarchy. 

In Prague, as over the rest of Bohemia, we find our- 
selves sadly hindered again by our inability to speak 
the language of the inhabitants ; for here the Czechish 
alone is spoken, and a barbarous combination of 
sounds it is. Beyond the picture gallery and the cathe- 
dral, however, we find that there really is not so very 
much to be seen in Prague. The statuary on the pub- 
lic squares is fine, but on an extended journey one sees 
so many statues that they fail, toward the last, to 
impress us. The bridges over the Moldau are splendid 
spans, and the churches are most impressive. 

The picture gallery holds us longest, for here are 
gathered originals of many of the great masters — Van 
Ruysdael, Millet, Rembrandt, and Rubens, Jan Steen, 
Cuyp, and Defregger; one and all are here. We are 



136 A LITTLE JOURNEY TO AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 

very close to picture-gallery land, Germany, at this 
place, and for an intimate study of these men must go 
to the great galleries there. We are not urged to 
linger among the Czechs; they are a race unto them- 
selves, and make us feel that they can do very well 
without us. So after having made the promenade of 
the main streets, as every one does at Prague, we pre- 
pare to leave. In fact, steamer-departure time is 
close at hand, and we shall have to race for it, back 
by rail across country to Munich and Innsbruck, 
southeast to Milan, and so on to Genoa, whence our 
boat is to sail. And so, gathering together our souve- 
nirs, our post-cards and our photographs of all this 
long globe-trotting expedition, we bid Austria-Hungary 
a final adieu. 




MARIA THERESA MONUMENT, VIENNA 



56 



AUSTRIAN NATIONAL SONG. 



Laurenz Leop. Haschka, 1797. 

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"Heaven reward him, God defend him," 

Thus we sing and thus we pray; 
Kaiser, Emperor, Monarch, Father, 

All thy peaceful rule obey! 



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In the German heart shall ever 

He the brightest memory be. 
Till in other worlds, a welcome 

Greets in blest eternity; 
God defend thee, God attend thee, 

Emperor, Franz, all hail to thee! 






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